


Tapestry From An Asteroid

by 64907



Series: Tapestry From An Asteroid [1]
Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Angst, Explicit Sexual Content, Future, Genetic Engineering, Genetically Engineered Beings, M/M, Off-World, Outer Space, Prostitution, Resolved Sexual Tension, Robotics, Science Fiction, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-13
Updated: 2015-02-13
Packaged: 2018-03-10 15:19:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 56,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3295184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/64907/pseuds/64907
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 2236, and in a galaxy two point seven million light years away, Matsumoto Jun is a top earning pleasure model replicant, a bot who spent most of his life being dedicated to his purpose. He's nearing his termination as an android when his life takes a rather different turn.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 2236

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Valentine's Day. This was very loosely inspired by Blade Runner so you don't need to watch that film to understand this. My profound thanks to [yoshi09](http://archiveofourown.org/users/yoshi09/pseuds/yoshi09) who did a stellar job in looking over this big baby and helping me out. You are amazing and I can never thank you enough. ♥ Any mistakes remaining are mine.
> 
> The title was taken from the same Sun Ra song. This story is also posted on [Livejournal](http://64907.livejournal.com/10978.html).

**Year 2236, September 17th, in the off-world colony of Praximus V, in the Triangulum Galaxy.**  
  
Ninomiya waves a fork at his direction, a piece of the hamburger steak he’s currently eating still attached to its end. “You know, you’re too wound up, Matsumoto, so how about you try and live a little for a change?” Ninomiya peers at him under his lashes, flashing him the same haughty, confident smirk he uses for most of his clients. It would have worked on any other person really, except that Jun is like Nino so he isn’t fussed. He merely raises an eyebrow.  
  
They’re sitting across each other in a diner on a chilly, late Saturday night for an equally late dinner after taking care of a client’s joint request for both of their services. Jun’s having a salad and Nino, who obviously doesn’t have any fuck left to give regarding his figure, orders a platter of hamburger steak as a reward for all his hard work tonight, or so he tells Jun.  
  
“And I say, mind your own business,” he says, crossing his arms over his chest. “And please, learn how to talk after swallowing your food. It’s not attractive.” He rolls his eyes. Sometimes he can’t believe that he and Nino are of the same model. What Jun tries his best to observe carefully Nino blatantly disregards. Once, Jun told him to dress up for a client, to make himself actually presentable, and Nino shows up in the meeting place wearing nothing but a plain white tee and faded jeans, his hands shoved inside his pockets. He even had the gall to whistle in Jun’s face when Jun stared at him in wide-eyed horror.  
  
That night turned out to be one of Nino’s highest paid nights. Jun knows because Nino likes to rub it in his face, often saying, “Maybe they just find me more charming than you, Jun-kun, that I don’t have to look like a professional and they will still pay me handsomely for my talents.”  
  
“But you are a professional,” Jun will shoot back, and Nino will just laugh and say, “Why yes, I am. That must have been very hard for you to admit.” He will then pat Jun’s shoulder good-naturedly. “I appreciate it, Jun-kun,” he will add, and Jun will have to suppress the urge to invoke any lasting damage to Nino. It’ll be bad for business.  
  
Right now, Nino’s looking at him like he’s plotting the next annoying thing he can say, just to test the limits of Jun’s patience. Jun actually likes Nino and Nino’s one of the very few replicants he found himself able to form a friendship with, no matter how unlikely that seems at first glance, because what he tries to uphold, Nino ignores. For Jun, who likes rules, he just can’t understand why Nino refuses to follow explicitly what they’ve been programmed for. When he asks Nino about it, Nino simply shrugs and says, “I told you, you’re too wound up.”  
  
Nino suddenly laughs, and it’s the type of laugh he uses when he just thought of something that’s either incredibly ingenious or incredibly naughty. Jun doesn’t know what to expect and doesn’t know which would be better. He frowns and waits.  
  
“How much time do you have left, Jun-kun?” Nino says, voice suddenly dropping, eyes turning serious, the lightheartedness of earlier vanishing in an instant. It’s a complete 180 from earlier and Jun thinks, had he been human, he would have been caught completely off-guard.  
  
Had he been human though, Nino wouldn’t even ask such a thing. “Long enough,” he tells Nino, refusing to elaborate, refusing to draw a card and play along. Nino’s expression shifts after a moment and suddenly he’s simply looking amused; too amused in fact, that Jun’s beginning to feel uncomfortable. They stare at each other for a moment before Nino grins at him. He tells Jun he’ll call back soon for a meet-up and Jun better show up and not waste his effort. Nino leaves him alone in the diner after that.  
  
When a waitress comes over for the bill Jun curses.  
  
\--  
  
Three days later he gets a call from Nino. He rejects it, twice, still hating the fact that he paid for what he didn’t even eat, and when Nino leaves a voice message of, “All right, I’m sorry about the bill,” in a voice that doesn’t have any hint of remorse, he finally picks up against his better judgment. He hears laughter at the end of the line, and the sound effects from what is most likely the latest version of the ZG-005 gaming console, and he rolls his eyes. “What do you want?” he asks, trying to sound bored and uninterested when he’s really feeling skeptical about taking this call.  
  
Eighty point three percent of the time, talking to Nino never does him any good and only seems to speed up his impending expiration.  
  
Nino just gives him an address, and tells him to show up in, “Casual clothing, Jun-kun. No one’s asking for the pleasure model Matsumoto Jun for tonight,” before hanging up. Trust Nino to ask him to come for a shady meet-up without even wearing clothes he’s more comfortable with. In truth, Jun’s only comfortable wearing his “pleasure model clothes” (there’s a reason Nino calls him Emperor when they’re at work) because it reminds him of his purpose, of what he’s supposedly good at in this section of the universe.  
  
Still, Nino is his friend, no matter how much of a little shit he is to Jun sometimes. More like all the time, his head supplies, but he still goes for the leather jacket and his most comfortable pair of jeans. He completes the look with a pair of casual sandals, and when he looks at himself at the mirror, he thinks Ninomiya will be actually proud of him when he sees him. Satisfied with what he sees, he leaves his apartment, pocketing his keycard in the back of his jeans.  
  
\--  
  
He finds himself in a members-only bar, which is not too different from the ones he often finds himself in when he’s feeling particularly indulgent with himself after a rewarding but exhausting night on the job, and as it turns out, there is a private booth reserved for him. He wonders how much credits this whole setup had cost Nino. He shudders in disbelief at the thought of Nino spending, so he quits it.  
  
The replicant at the front door didn’t even blink, just asked him to confirm his name and led him to the booth. Sitting alone and waiting for who knows what, he’s starting to feel unsettled. Sure, he’s been in similar bars often enough in Praximus to know what to do, to know when to smile and how to smile, to know how to move when he wants a job done. He’s programmed for that. But just because he’s bioengineered doesn’t mean he doesn’t know how to feel uncomfortable.  
  
There’s a reason Jun likes rules. He likes them because through them, he knows his limitations, can set his own limitations. Replicants have become more socially accepted since the beginning of the 22nd century, and thirty-four years later, they’ve become so developed that they are now capable of emotions, of empathy, of feeling. More human than human, as the slogan of one corporation had said. So after the initial ban on replicants was lifted, various corporations had millions of them scattered across the different off-world colonies, letting them do what they’re supposed to do, what they’re programmed to do, and at the same time testing, in their limited time, just how capable they are of feeling, just how far the program allows them to feel, just how much the program evolved.  
  
In a way replicants are simply prototypes and it won’t be long before Jun’s model becomes obsolete, phased out.  
  
He checks the time. He’s been here for six minutes and twenty-eight seconds. He drums his fingers against the table, and on the 246th time his finger makes contact with the surface, he sees the same replicant from the door, ushering another one in. Another one he doesn’t know, another one he never met. He cocks his head. At first he thinks it might be a client, but he realizes Nino never really recommends clients to him because he’s a selfish bastard who likes to keep all the high-paying ones for himself.  
  
“I want to retire rich, Jun-kun,” Nino would say with a hand over his chest and the most annoying smirk on his face. “Who doesn’t want to retire early and rich?”  
  
Jun looks at the man in front of him, appraises him from head to toe, before moving back up. No, not a human. He’s a replicant too, he notes, because one of the advantages of being a pleasure model is knowing the telltale signs of a fellow bioengineered android. Jun knows a fellow replicant when he sees one, because it comes with the program.  
  
“Name?” he says, choosing to break the silence by doing the straightforward approach. The other guy just shrugs and slides in front of him in the booth, before gesturing to the nearby attendant and asking for a mojito. When the attendant looks at Jun, the stranger says, “The same,” at the same time Jun’s saying, “A vodka martini, please.” For a moment he and the stranger simply stare at one another, the attendant darting glances between them, unsure of what to do.  
  
Finally, the stranger shrugs. “What he said,” dismissing the attendant with a wave of his hand. Jun tilts his head in interest, unabashedly observing the replicant before him. He’s wearing a white v-neck, his collarbones peering at the edges. Not enough information from his clothing to gauge what he does for a living, what his purpose is, what he’s programmed for. Jun notes he possesses eyes that would probably have lines surrounding each if he laughs.  
  
He tries again. “Your name?” and the stranger just leans back, resting most of his weight against the cushions, before replying, “Sho.” Huh. It’s an uncommon name, Jun thinks, but not unheard of. Still, he thinks it’s better compared to his generic, unisex name. Whoever made Sho got a bit creative, and Jun’s a bit envious of him for that. Envy, he notes, is a new emotion, one he never felt before. Interesting.  
  
Before Jun even considers introducing himself and returning favor, Sho is saying, “And you’re Matsumoto,” and when he frowns, Sho just shrugs his shoulders. “Nino told me,” he says as an afterthought, and Jun’s eyebrow immediately went up at the formal use of his name, and at the familiarity Sho seems to have with Nino. I see, he thinks. Is that how it is? His eyes narrow. The next time he sees Ninomiya will probably the last time Praximus V will ever see pleasure model Ninomiya Kazunari. He hates it whenever Nino goes behind his back. The only time it proved useful was when Nino couldn’t make it to a commitment and he signed Jun up instead. That was one job that kept Jun’s pockets full for more than half a year.  
  
The attendant from earlier comes back with their drinks and for a while he and Sho simply look at each other. As a replicant, Jun knows he ought to feel shame for the length of eye contact, but the perks of being a pleasure model is that shame was never part of the program, saving space for only terabytes of confidence and charm. Sho, however, is not a pleasure model, and he proves this when he’s the first one to break eye contact. Good, Jun thinks. At least Nino didn’t set him up with a potential competitor in their line of work. He wouldn’t put it past Nino to do that though, it was still his scheme that put Jun here.  
  
Sho sips his drink before licking his lips to chase the minty flavor. “Incept date?” he asks Jun, and Jun thinks, Ah. Now we’re talking. Now he understands why Nino set him up for this. It was because of that conversation in the diner from three point six days ago, when he dodged the question by answering he’s got long enough. Jun decides to be truthful this time, because what more harm could it do? He’s living on borrowed time anyway, as all replicants do.  
  
“Year 2233, August 30th,” he says, sipping his martini. “You?”  
  
Sho makes no indication of hearing the question. All right. The secretive type then, Jun thinks. While it’s a common knowledge that replicants possess only a four-year lifespan, not every replicant seems to be okay with that reality. Jun knows of stories of certain types who ventured back to Earth, asking for an extension, trying to find a way to circumvent things. It never worked because they’ve all been engineered long enough to last for only four years, after that, they will simply drop dead to their feet, their purpose served and their program shutting itself down. Instant contract termination, in short.  
  
It was just the way things are.  
  
However, Sho might not be okay with that, so Jun doesn’t press. He can respect Sho’s privacy, even if they just met and he honestly feels annoyed he waited for seven minutes and two seconds by his lonesome in some private booth reserved by Ninomiya. He can be, after all, more human than human.  
  
Jun leans forward on his elbows, eyes focused on Sho. Time for business.  
  
“I have exactly eleven months, ten days, and,” he checks his watch for a dramatic effect. After all, they both know he doesn’t need a watch, that he simply wears it just to blend in. Jun’s practically letting his program run the show now. “Let’s see, fourteen hours and thirty-eight seconds before I shrivel and die,” he tells Sho, meeting his eyes across the table. “So you best make this worth my while.”  
  
Sho merely raises an eyebrow, hiding a smirk behind his glass of mojito. Most people would have been put off by Jun’s sudden display of confidence, his sudden attempt to put the situation to his advantage. But Sho’s a replicant and while he may not be a pleasure type like Jun or like Nino, he’s still not human, despite being capable of acting like one, so he doesn’t even appear intimidated. It’s weird how they can be so unlike humans and yet so like them in appearance. Sometimes, Jun wonders if their creators had ever been terrified of the idea, that something they made can act like them, imitate them perfectly, and even surpass their humanity at times. Maybe that’s why they’re designed to have a limited time in the first place, because you can’t have too much of a good thing for a long time.  
  
Sho clears his throat. “Okay,” he says, and Jun notices a sudden change of demeanor in his fellow replicant, like Sho suddenly sees the challenge and wants to prove that he is capable of doing it.  
  
If there was one thing Jun never doubted about Nino, it was his ability to pick people that will most likely hold Jun’s interest for more than five minutes. To Sho’s credit, he has Jun’s attention for nine minutes and forty-two seconds, and counting.  
  
“Where have you been mostly to, in the last three years?” Sho asks him, and Jun doesn’t even bother to fight the smirk. “Do I look like a combat model to you?” he asks back and when color rises to Sho’s cheeks, Jun feels satisfied with the knowledge that his program is universal enough that it works for both humans and almost humans.  
  
“Didn’t want to assume—“ Sho is saying, but Jun cuts him off with, “The pleasure district, the high-end establishments mostly,” which is the answer that Sho’s probably looking for. Ever since he boarded the off-world shuttle for the Triangulum Galaxy, he never really sought any alternative form of work. He knows what he was made for, and he thought to himself he will use his design to the best of his ability to leave an impression, a lingering memory.  
  
This time Sho doesn’t look surprised. Which is what Jun expected, really, because Sho clearly knows Nino, and Nino, had he not been friends with Jun, would have been one of Jun’s biggest competitors in their line of work. In fact, there are only two types of people who can call Nino Nino: the regular, high-paying clients, and the very few he deems as friends. Jun is certain Sho’s not a high-paying client, so he might as well be in the latter category.  
  
He lets his curiosity get the better of him. “How do you know Nino?” and Sho just shrugs noncommittally, saying, “Everybody knows Nino,” before clarifying, “At least from where I’m from.”  
  
“And where are you from?”  
  
Sho cocks his head. “I work a life of honest labor,” he says, and Jun sneers at him in response. It doesn’t answer the question, and the way Sho said it would probably have other pleasure models feel offended, if they’re already capable of feeling offense that is, but Jun shares the same line of work as Nino does and they both had their fair share of people and replicants alike who look down on what they do. Three years on the job makes you used to it.  
  
Thankfully, Jun’s not like other pleasure models. “Like what?” he indulges Sho. “Construction?”  
  
“Repairs, mostly. I’m good with shuttles,” Sho tells him, and he’s not bragging, merely stating a fact.  
  
Satisfied, Jun leans back on his elbows. “All right,” he says, because he already knows something about Sho other than his name and that’s enough progress for the night. They’ve been in this booth for forty-three minutes and twelve seconds now. “What do you propose we do?”  
  
Sho pulls out a card from his jeans pocket and slides it across the table. “Monday evening, I’ll be there,” is all he says, then he’s getting up, pulling his shirt back to place. He tilts his head at Jun in acknowledgement, and Jun nods back. Jun looks at the card and sees that it only bears an address, to a place that’s more or less thirty miles away from the main city of Praximus.  
  
After two minutes (and thirty-one seconds, his programming tells him), he gets up from the booth and when he approaches the attendant from earlier to pay for his share, she tells him a man already took care of it a while ago.  
  
When he steps outside, he sends Ninomiya a note of, “You imp,” and immediately gets a hologram of a kiss as a reply back. He almost flings his handheld tablet to the side.  
  
\--  
  
“I take that it went well?” Nino’s practically leering at him and Jun thinks he’s not too awake for this. They’re having breakfast at his apartment (actually, Nino just rang his doorbell this morning and let himself in when Jun opened the door), and Jun feels too sleep-deprived. He’s never been a morning person, but no amount of caffeine can ever make him stomach Ninomiya’s bullshit, so he cuts to the chase. “I didn’t fuck him, if that’s what you’re saying.”  
  
Nino puts a hand over his mouth, a gesture of mock surprise. Jun wants to throw a plate at his head. “You mean you didn’t fuck him _yet_. Have you seen him, Jun-kun? He’s not even a pleasure model but had he been, we’ll probably lose almost half of our clients to him.” And even if he’s not that awake yet, Jun knows Nino is far from exaggerating. He did get a good look at Sho’s… assets, as he left the establishment before Jun last night.  
  
“Thank our lucky stars he’s not a pleasure model then,” he says and Nino just laughs. The bastard’s really enjoying this. “How did you get to know him, by the way?”  
  
Nino chews the toast Jun made for him, looking contemplative. “Aiba-shi,” he says, after swallowing (thank God he actually remembered how to do that this time, Jun thinks).  
  
Aiba-shi is actually Aiba Masaki, a retired genetic engineer who was responsible for Nino’s programming. Honestly, Jun blames Aiba for most things regarding Nino, because it’s possible that only he can program a replicant to be so consistently annoying in this quadrant of the galaxy. Replicants are, after all, an almost carbon copy of their designers, so what you see in Nino is basically what you see in Aiba as well.  
  
Jun frowns. “And how, pray tell, did Aiba get to know Sho?”  
  
Nino’s eyes widen, then he’s grinning in a way that can probably split his face in half. “What?” Jun asks, “You didn’t think he’ll give me his name?” He scoffs. Jun’s hardly the type who gets refused, and never the type who gets rejected. Sure, there are clients who prefer Nino’s devilish charm over his, but Jun’s got his fair share of clients as well, and they have nothing but praise for him.  
  
“No, I have no doubt how persuasive you can be even without exerting any modicum of effort,” Nino says, smirk still in place. “I just didn’t think he’d actually come, much less tell you who he is,” and this successfully grabs Jun’s interest, most of his sleepiness forgotten.  
  
So Sho is not only secretive regarding his date of manufacture, he’s also known for being a snob, despite being a replicant. Excellent. Of course Ninomiya set him up with someone supposedly difficult. Jun really wants to strangle Nino now, and the only thing stopping him is the table between them, because that table probably costs more than what Nino chooses to wear most of the time. Jun’s not risking damaging his precious furniture, thank you very much.  
  
Then again, it’s a known fact that Jun likes challenges, and that he doesn’t really back down when he sees one. He just hates the fact that Nino knows this too well, knows him too well that he didn’t even doubt that Jun is the man (or the replicant, that is,) for the job.  
  
Nino plops his chin on his right hand, his left one preoccupied with shoving another piece of toast in his mouth. “How many times did you ask for his name till you got it?” he asks Jun, expression infinitely curious. He obviously knows something Jun doesn’t.  
  
Jun narrows his eyes and thinks of the events last night. “Two,” he answers, and Nino smiles wider, like there’s an inside joke and Jun’s not privy to it. Wouldn’t be the first time that has happened, Jun thinks bitterly. “What of it?”  
  
Nino just waves a hand at him. “And how many people, clients and non-clients alike, human and not human included, did you have to ask more than once to get what you want?”  
  
Jun blinks. “Three,” he says, and Nino’s eyebrows shoot up. “Not counting me and Aiba-shi,” Nino counters immediately, and this time Jun is glaring at him. “One,” he says through his teeth.  
  
Nino’s grinning at him now, expression completely victorious. “It’s always nice to find exceptions to the programming, isn’t it?” he tells Jun, and Jun’s thinking of reconsidering strangling Nino. Trust Nino to try to put Jun completely out of his element and to actually succeed at it. No wonder Aiba calls Nino his, “most finest work, Jun-chan!” (“Your grammar is laughable,” Jun tells Aiba, and he just winks at Jun. Or at least, tries to. Aiba can’t wink.) Nino, like Aiba, can seem to do the deemed to be impossible.  
  
Jun, like Nino, is a top earning pleasure model replicant. He and Nino were both manufactured by the Kitagawa Corporation, the pioneer and umbrella in genetically engineered androids. Unlike Nino, however, Jun doesn’t know the engineer behind his programming. He only knows that whoever it is decided to give him a very meticulous attitude over everything and made him too human by adding overthinking in his coding syntax.  
  
Meaning, he’s starting to have doubts about meeting Sho on Monday.  
  
Nino, being the perceptive, annoying bastard that he is in Jun’s life, seems to notice this. “Don’t even think of not going,” he points an accusatory finger at Jun. “I know he asked to meet you again, and you’re not the only one getting a bad impression if you don’t go, Matsumoto, this is also on me and on Aiba-shi.”  
  
Great, now Jun feels guilty. He has no problems with getting even with Ninomiya. Everyone, probably at one point in their lives, always wants to get even with Nino. He’s not an exception to that. It’s the fact that if he drags Nino down, he’s also inadvertently dragging Aiba as well.  
  
Aiba, who retired from his engineer job at the corporation because, “I wanted to make a change,” and thought maybe Praximus V is finally the place to do what he couldn’t in Earth, Aiba who once tried to channel his passion for knowledge by going to engineering and helping to bioengineer replicants and dropping out immediately once he realized it wasn’t what he was looking for.  
  
Shit, Jun can’t do that to that Aiba.  
  
“Fine, I’ll go,” he acquiesces, earning a sigh of relief from Nino. “But only if you tell me how Aiba met Sho.”  
  
And there’s Nino’s annoying smirk again, the one that really pisses off Jun so much. He’s so close to throwing anything within reach at Nino’s head. “I have a better idea,” Nino says, which only means he has an idea Jun won’t like very much. “How about you ask that question to Sho-chan yourself?”  
  
“Sho-chan?” Jun repeats, drawling out the last syllable, his eyebrow climbing steadily to his hairline.  
  
And Nino just winks at him and laughs again at Jun’s surprised face. “Just because Aiba-shi can’t do it doesn’t mean I can’t do it too,” he explains, wiping his hands on his jeans. “I’m his, ‘most finest work’ after all.”  
  
Jun groans. “Please never repeat that again in my presence,” and this time, Nino doesn’t stop laughing, no matter how many threats Jun made for the rest of the morning. Jun shoves his face in his hands, already hating his life and what remains of it.  
  
\--  
  
The address Sho gave him turned out to be the Praximus Main Shipyard, where every shuttle entering and leaving Praximus V acquires clearance before they can take off to the vestiges of both the explored and unexplored corners of space, or simply unload passengers, humans and replicants alike, to the off-world colony. Jun shows up in the early evening, just after the second sun of Praximus gave way to its eight moons.  
  
The shipyard consists of massive metal infrastructures, some rising to more than six-hundred feet tall. Freight shuttles fly overhead in various directions and at frequent intervals, along with beams carrying heavy equipment and machinery, voices booming from the intercoms paging various workers and shuttle numbers. There’s so much activity in the area that it took longer than usual for Jun to be noticed but Jun was eventually noticed, and he knows the meaning of those looks.  
  
He doesn’t belong here, that much is evident. After all, he wore his usual “Emperor” clothes: a black coat thrown over a white shirt with a black vest, a pair of white slacks, and sneakers that definitely cost more than Ninomiya’s gaming consoles. He also wore a necklace to accentuate his entire look. He’s the very image of a pleasure model, and he made certain of that.  
  
Jun can feel eyes on him, and he smirks. He doesn’t even have to try in order to be noticed, what more when he actually exerts effort, puts the program to work? He strides in the main hallway of the shipyard bursting with confidence, knowing that while he may not necessarily belong here, his presence is far from being completely unappreciated. In fact, more than once he felt appreciative glances being thrown his way, from shuttle passengers and shipyard workers alike.  
  
He keeps an eye out for Sho, darting glances at every corner of the shipyard, even looking at the corners of parked shuttles. He’s starting to feel annoyed when he hears someone clear their throat behind him. He turns around and sees a man clutching an access display pad, looking too sleepy to be working in a shipyard, his skin tanned in a way that indicates his frequent exposure to Praximus V’s twin suns. Jun raises an eyebrow in inquiry and the man gives him a small smile.  
  
“My name is Ohno Satoshi,” the small man says, before handing him a card with both hands. Jun eyes the card for a moment before pulling his own from his coat pocket. Ohno nods gratefully as he takes Jun’s card, Jun doing the same with a slight incline of his head.  
  
Ohno extends a hand at Jun. "I'm the shipyard foreman."  
  
Jun tilts his head. “Matsumoto Jun,” he says, shaking Ohno’s hand. He opted not to elaborate further, because Ohno’s already reading the card with interest, and when he meets Jun’s eyes again, he looks less sleepy than before.  
  
“So,” Ohno says, smile never leaving his face. “What can I help you with, Matsumoto-san?” He sounds genuine in his intention to help but Jun knows it’s just his way of casually removing the unprecedented slight disruption of work Jun might have caused when he strode in. Jun returns the smile. Ohno may not look like much but he definitely didn’t become a foreman just because. He’s sharp, Jun will give him that. Observant, even.  
  
Jun decides to make Ohno’s job easier. “I’m looking for someone who, I suppose, works here,” he explains, “I suppose you can help me find him?” Jun knows that Ohno is aware just how much Jun stands out in this platform and he will probably do all he can to make sure that ends soon enough. Still, that doesn’t mean Jun won’t make him work for it for a bit.  
  
Ohno seems to catch on to this ploy quickly enough. “Sure,” he flicks a finger on his display pad for effect. “What’s his name?” Jun notes how Ohno never seems to run out of patience, despite Jun taking twice as long to cut to the chase. He wonders if most workers in the shipyard are like this. This will be the second time a stranger interested him, and like the first one, they hail from the same corner of the colony.  
  
The shipyard seems to be full of surprises.  
  
“He didn’t give me his full name,” Jun explains, eyeing Ohno’s pad with mild curiosity. “Sho,” he says, finally giving in. At the mention of the name, Ohno immediately looks up at him, putting down his pad, a frown forming on his face. Huh. For a moment Jun didn’t think Ohno was capable of that.  
  
Jun cocks his head, daring Ohno to say something. After a while, Ohno’s face relaxes. “Sho-kun’s this way,” is the only thing he says, before leading Jun to a corner of the shipyard, where sparks echo off the walls, leaving massive shadows of workers from time to time. There’s a flurry of activity on this side, workers shouting instructions to one another. It took a moment for either Jun or Ohno to be noticed, but the noise died down when attention shifted to them. Jun doesn’t know if he or Ohno did that, but he mostly suspects it’s him, because Ohno simply shrugs and waves a hand for the workers to carry on with what they’re doing.  
  
Ohno leads him to a parked shuttle nearby, and he pounds on its doors twice. “Sho-kun?” he calls out, “Sho-kun, there’s someone here to see you!” Jun thinks Ohno sounded too joyful for that statement, but when he’s about to comment on it, he sees a pair of legs slowly appearing from underneath the shuttle, wearing light blue overalls. He raises an eyebrow.  
  
“Satoshi-kun?” Jun hears from the floor, the legs slowly showing a body, and finally, a face. “Satoshi-kun, wha—?” the voice says, which turns out to be Sho’s, and from the floor, he’s looking at Jun like he’s the last person Sho expected to see. Jun cocks his head, before looking at Sho from head to toe. Jun smiles. He probably forgot it’s Monday today. He’s mostly covered in grease, a real sign of working hard, so Jun won’t put it past him.  
  
Then again, Jun has never heard of replicants forgetting things.  
  
“Oh,” Ohno says, looking only mildly surprised. “I thought you were inside.” Sho struggles to get up from his place from under the shuttle, and there’s a bit of movement before he finally stands in front of Jun and Ohno. Ohno simply shrugs, tapping Sho’s shoulder before saying, “I’ll leave you two to it,” and with a nod directed at Jun, he says, “It was a pleasure to meet you, Matsumoto-san.”  
  
Jun nods back in acknowledgement, and for a while he and Sho watch Ohno leave. Jun clears his throat after almost a minute of silence. “He’s not a replicant, is he?” he asks Sho, mostly because he can’t come up with something clever to say, partly because he’s curious about Ohno. He was a man of very few words, but it took less than a minute for him to catch on to whatever Jun was playing at earlier in the main platform. Not very many people can do that.  
  
“No, he’s human,” Sho answers, wiping the remains of grease on his hands on his pants. Jun waits for him to say something else, but Sho simply glances at him, before going to the side and crouching before a toolbox, arranging the variety of wrenches in different sizes inside.  
  
Jun’s eyebrow shoots up. He’s starting to feel ticked off. Sho didn’t even look at him, just spared him a quick glance from head to toe, before resuming his work. At least the look Jun gave him earlier was longer, and no offense meant to Sho, but Jun looks way more presentable than him. What the hell did he invite Jun here for, then? Jun crosses his arms over his chest, leaning against the parked shuttle.  
  
“Well,” Jun begins, trying to rein in his temper. It never did him any good. He wonders if his programmer thought it’ll be good to add a shortage of patience to an android. “Why did you ask me to come?” He decides to get to the point of things. The night is early and if Sho continues like this, well, Jun can find other things way more deserving of his time. He can also definitely find his way back without Ohno’s help, so really, Sho just better spit it out.  
  
Sho exhales before looking at him. “I’m going to show you how to fix a shuttle,” he says, and Jun’s eyes widen.  
  
“What,” Jun says, and Sho simply tilts his head, his expression never betraying anything.  
  
“You heard what I said,” Sho tells him before getting up and walking towards where Jun is currently putting most of his weight on. He hands Jun a small coiled piece of what looks like something made from tritanium metal, and if Jun’s right about the material, that means Sho’s giving him a very delicate piece that can make or break an equipment. He’s really serious about this, Jun realizes.  
  
“I’m not dressed properly for this,” Jun tells Sho, his arms still crossed over his chest.  
  
Sho gives him another once over. “I noticed,” he says, cocking his head.  
  
Jun frowns. This isn’t going according to plan. He gives Sho his best glare, but Sho simply stares back, looking mostly unaffected. If Jun knew him long enough, he’ll think he can see the barest hints of amusement in Sho’s eyes.  
  
Jun finally sighs, taking the coil from Sho. “I’ll need gloves,” and Sho simply reaches inside his pants pockets to retrieve a pair that looks good as new. Obviously, Sho never wore them. Jun raises an eyebrow and Sho just says, “They get in the way sometimes,” by way of an explanation, before handing the pair to Jun.  
  
Jun grabs them a bit forcefully, trying to show Sho just how much he doesn’t approve of this development. “You know, you still haven’t told me whatever it is we’re doing,” he accuses Sho, before putting the gloves on. They fit just fine, Jun notes, and he glances at Sho’s mostly grease-covered hands for a second. Their hands are probably of the same size, he thinks.  
  
Sho doesn’t even indicate he heard Jun. He walks past Jun, keying a sequence to open the shuttle hatch, and steps inside. Jun rolls his eyes and makes one last exasperated sigh before following him. He’s really considering putting an end to Ninomiya Kazunari’s successful career as a pleasure model. Jun thinks he can do it if he puts his mind to it.  
  
He finds Sho crouching in front of what seems to be a busted flight conductor. “When we met,” Sho begins, and Jun looks at him expectantly. “That night, in the bar. You told me you haven’t got long enough.”  
  
Jun corrects him almost immediately, “I have long enough, depending on how I use it.” Sho hums at that, and somehow, it pisses Jun off. Temper, Jun. Temper, he tells himself. It doesn’t work. Jun’s breath is coming out in angry huffs now. “And I really didn’t think I’ll spend my remaining days fixing shuttles, but here I am, so can you get to the point?”  
  
Sho looks at him, and it’s the first time he actually looked, Jun realizes. The first time he actually gave Jun more than a glance. Jun notices Sho’s eyes lingering on his necklace, before moving back to his face. “You also said you’ve never been out of the pleasure district,” Sho says, both his voice and his expression giving nothing away, nothing for Jun to take note of and interpret.  
  
If Jun will be honest, he actually feels a little delighted that Sho remembers that. Then again, replicants hardly forget anything. Jun decides to step up his game. He turns his switch on. “I’m glad you remember that,” giving Sho a taste of pleasure model Matsumoto Jun. He smirks when he sees Sho narrowing his eyes. Good, he thinks. My turn. “Though you seem to have forgotten it’s Monday, I’m honestly happy you remembered more than I expected.”  
  
Sho swallows a lump in his throat. Not so immune to my nature then, Jun thinks, feeling immense satisfaction over this revelation. “I have my moments,” Sho says, before finally gesturing to the broken console with a tilt of his head. Jun crouches down next to him, already noting that he opted for the position that is closer than necessary to Sho. Sho seems to realize this as well, because he narrows his eyes for a moment before blinking the expression away.  
  
Like this, Jun can feel Sho’s artificial body heat, and if Jun so much tilts his head sideways, he’ll find himself facing Sho’s jawline. Let’s see how well he does with the two of us like this then, Jun thinks. He never said he wasn’t underhanded. There’s a reason he’s the only replicant Nino entered into a friendly competition with. Jun knows what he’s doing, and he’s extremely skilled at it.  
  
“Show me what to do with this,” Jun prompts him, and that seems to return Sho back from his daze.  
  
“This,” Sho points to the blinking part of the console before them, “is a flight conducting circuit. I have no idea what kind of pilot they had for this shuttle to have this in this state, because that’s not how it’s supposed to look like.”  
  
He says all of this without looking at Jun, and Jun notes that it’s definitely the proximity that throws Sho off. He finds himself amused at the idea. Jun’s playing to win so he removes one of the gloves he put on earlier. If Nino can see them right now, Jun thinks he’ll probably be over one of the eight moons of Praximus, laughing. Nino will probably say something like, “Give him a break, Jun-kun!” while slapping his knee.  
  
Jun looks at the part Sho indicated, and true enough, his initial assessment was right. It’s definitely busted, because the indicator is blinking red at irregular intervals, and the computer part of Jun tells him that that’s really not how that’s supposed to look like, unless the shuttlecraft pilot was, say, Aiba. He may have been programmed for something specific and far away from shipyards but this is basic stuff. For replicants, at least. It’s their computer part that makes things easier to understand, easier to learn.  
  
And Jun is a fast learner, that much is certain.  
  
“So what do we do?” he asks Sho before reaching out, all too aware that his finger will brush Sho’s if he does so, and delights in the way Sho curls his hand in a fist as a response from the contact.  
  
“What I gave you earlier,” Sho begins, and Jun notices how his voice seems to increase slightly in pitch (2.3% increase, his computer brain tells him). “You attach that,” Sho reaches in his one of his pockets, pulling out pliers, “here, and later we adjust according to the specs.”  
  
Jun hums. “And after that?” he asks, tilting his face to look at Sho, who still won’t look at him. Jun counts it as a victory.  
  
“After that, we recalibrate the circuit paths and do a flight test on quarter impulse power,” Sho says, his hands already doing quick work on the circuit, snapping wires without hesitation. He’s the perfect picture of dedication and Jun finds himself admiring Sho for it, because apparently, not even Praximus V’s best-known pleasure models can make him snap out of his concentration.  
  
Jun knows he still has an effect on Sho though, and honestly, that was all he was aiming for when he left his apartment tonight. Their first meeting caught Jun off-guard, and Jun really needs to get back on his groove lest Nino laughs and rubs it on his face, so he’s actually putting his skills to work, despite how seemingly ineffective they were at first.  
  
“Place it there,” Sho tells him, gesturing to the open conduit he just made. He’s holding it open for Jun to be able to attach the tritanium coiling, and Jun, being Jun, makes sure he brushes his fingers with Sho’s as he does what he’s told. He doesn’t miss Sho’s intake of breath at the contact, and has to suppress the urge to smile. He settles for licking his lips instead, knowing full well Sho can see him doing it in his periphery.  
  
In the corner of his vision he can see Sho freezing, before gaining control again and this time, Jun doesn’t stop himself from smiling. He attaches the coil in place and when he draws back, Sho is saying, “You’re doing it on purpose,” his eyes closed as if he’s trying to hang on to the bits of remaining control he has.  
  
Jun smiles at him, the smile he gives his clients when they tell him that he’s good, that he did well. “I have no idea what you mean,” he says, and he laughs a bit when Sho sighs. “Though I’m the one who was suddenly asked to do repairs for reasons unknown, I think it’s fine if I try to get even, at least.” He tilts his head at Sho, and this close, Jun can smell just how hard Sho’s working for the day, the scent of shipyard work all over him.  
  
“You said I best make this worth your while,” Sho mumbles, which is what Jun didn’t expect him to say. He frowns, but after a moment he schools his features back to smugness, burying the surprise from earlier deep down.  
  
“And?” Jun asks. He wishes Sho will just cut to the chase and get it over with. “What’s fixing busted flight circuits got to do with that?”  
  
Sho meets his eyes this time, and they both know that it won’t take much movement for their skin to come in contact with the other’s, and this close, Jun can see how Sho’s lips alone will make him a very good competitor had he been a pleasure model like him and Nino.  
  
“You don’t know how to live,” Sho tells him flatly. This time Jun is so surprised that he’s sure he’s frowning at Sho.  
  
It takes a moment but Jun recovers, so he tilts his chin up at Sho in defiance. “And doing shipyard work is supposed to show me how to do that?” he says, eyebrow raising. “Fixing shuttlecrafts is a perfect example of living? For you, maybe, but for me, I don’t see how that works. Not exactly.”  
  
Sho blinks at him and looks away. “One day you might need it,” he tells Jun, his hands already screwing the console cover back into place. “One day you might need it when you feel like getting out of this place.”  
  
“I have no plans to leave Praximus,” Jun says immediately, making sure that his annoyance is clearly evident in his voice. He has eleven months left. What good would leaving do? He’s not exactly entertaining the idea of becoming a space pirate either. It’s far too late to indulge anything as creative as that.  
  
“For now, you don’t,” is all Sho says, before he gestures with his head towards the shuttle’s main panel, already standing up. Jun meets his eyes from above, before looking expectantly at Sho’s hands, waiting for an offer to help him stand. Sho simply looks unimpressed at his antics, before offering the hand not holding his tools, and Jun takes it with his gloved hand, cutting Sho some slack.  
  
This close, Jun realizes he’s a bit taller compared to Sho, but only by a few millimeters, perhaps.  
  
Sho turns his back on him and walks towards the main panel, Jun at his heels. Sho’s already keying sequences and subroutines and Jun watches as he meticulously scans over series of codes before editing them and even deleting some. Sho definitely wasn’t bragging when he said he’s good with shuttles but Jun thinks he may have more than enough reason to brag about it. He’s not only good, he’s apparently very good, and Jun can only watch in fascination as Sho redirects his newly-edited subroutines to the flight main frame, adjusting their recent tritanium coil modification according to the shuttlecraft model’s specifications.  
  
Sho gestures to the console on his left and Jun steps towards it. “We’ll do a flight test now and I need you to monitor if the power goes over a quarter of impulse,” Sho explains, “Can you do that for me?” and it’s a challenge, Jun knows it’s exactly what Sho meant in that tone of voice.  
  
Desperate to prove that it’s a challenge he can easily overcome, Jun just shrugs. “Just do it.”  
  
Sho keys in the flight sequence code and the shuttle roars to life. From his place at Sho’s left Jun can see from the shuttle windows that they rose to approximately five or six feet from the ground. He sneaks a glance in Sho’s direction. If Jun didn’t know better, he’ll say Sho’s starting to lose some of the reservations he showed towards Jun beginning from the moment they met. Then again, it might just be Sho looking genuinely pleased they actually got the work done and that Jun didn’t get in the way.  
  
“So what are we doing, exactly?” Jun breaks the silence, his eyes focused on the steadily climbing power level indicated on the console before him. “You’re going to ask me to do weekly repairs with you, is that it?”  
  
When Jun looks at Sho, it’s the first time for tonight that he saw genuine amusement evident on his face. Jun notes that he was right about the lines surrounding Sho’s eyes, and that they can only be seen when he smiles, even for a bit. Jun thinks it’s a good look on him, and that it’s such a shame that Sho doesn’t seem to be the type who gives way to smiling or laughing that much.  
  
“No,” Sho says, a tranquil look now on his face. “I believe it’s your turn now to ask me to do something.” He licks his lips. “I show you things, you show me things, and by the end, hopefully we both gained something in one way or another.”  
  
Well. That’s quite an offer, Jun thinks. For a moment he remembers Nino’s lewd suggestions from the night before, when Jun dropped him a holo saying he doesn’t know what to expect from Sho. Nino simply replies with a holo that enumerated a couple of crude ideas for recreation (some involving acrobatic sequences and creative use of innocuous equipment of daily life, even one that is supposedly effective against antigravity simulations), and Jun didn’t even let the message finish playing before deleting it.  
  
That doesn’t mean he wasn’t open to some of them, though. After all, Nino can get very creative.  
  
He shoves the thought away. He doesn’t even know Sho for that long. And Sho’s not a client either, so no matter how passable he may appear for a model he wasn’t designed for, there are some things Jun can’t act on.  
  
Not yet, at least, a voice sounding very much akin to Nino’s says in his head. This is really neither the time nor the place, Jun thinks angrily, shoving the idea aside once more.  
  
“You said I don’t know how to live,” he says to Sho, and Sho looks at him before nodding. He’s not taking it back and Jun doesn’t know what to make of that so he pushes, “Then show me how, if you know so much that you’re able to say that to my face.”  
  
He thinks this is probably why Nino set him up with Sho that night in the first place. All because he’s “too wound up,” and needs to “live a little.” Seriously, does everybody think that? The idea itself is alarming.  
  
Sho smiles before turning back to his console, keying a final string of code that sends the shuttle back to the ground. He faces Jun and extends a hand in front of him. “You have a deal,” he says, and Jun narrows his eyes for a moment, before shaking Sho’s hand with his ungloved one, a smile on his face as he does so.  
  
Sho looks at their linked hands for a moment, before letting go and squaring his shoulders and looking professional once more. “Shall we?” he gestures to the shuttle doors and Jun follows him out.  
  
Outside, Jun is cracking his shoulder and neck joints when he feels Sho’s eyes on him. When he meets Sho’s eyes, Sho gestures with a tilt of his head to other shuttles parked alongside the one they just fixed. Jun widens his eyes at him and Sho simply says, “Well, it’s not every day I get some help.”  
  
Three shuttlecrafts later, all of which were cases of busted flight conductors (seriously, Jun is starting to wonder about the inadequacy of pilot training), Sho finally wipes a sweat from his brow, telling Jun that they’re done for the night, before undoing the buttons of the top of his overalls, revealing a sleeveless undershirt beneath. He then ties the sleeves of his shipyard uniform around his waist, before cracking his neck joints. Jun looks at him appreciatively; making a mental note that Sho definitely hides a toned body under that horrible light blue uniform. No wonder Nino had nothing but lecherous ideas to feed him ever since. If Sho ever notices Jun’s sight lingering on his arms and every bit of exposed skin, he thankfully doesn’t call Jun out on it.  
  
And, well, if he ever does, Jun thinks he can always play it cool and say it’s simply part of his program to appreciate aesthetics accordingly.  
  
Sho offers to walk him out of the shipyard and Jun acquiesces, even if he can find his way back perfectly. He thinks it’s his reward for lending Sho a hand for tonight. On their way out, Jun notices the looks they got when they walk together, and he’s fairly certain Sho notices them, too. Most are puzzled looks, and yet there are some lingering gazes, because Jun is Jun and he’s more than aware of how he looks, thank you very much. Not even shipyard work can dull his shine, he thinks, but he catches some looks thrown in Sho’s way, and he feels a bit jealous. Sho may be covered in grime and every mark indicating labor, but with the way that shirt of his is hugging his figure, well.  
  
Jun’s really considering going with one of Nino’s creative ideas now. Especially now that he vaguely remembers Nino saying in his holo something about maximizing shuttlecraft resources.  
  
Neither the time nor the place, he repeats to himself, walking briskly.  
  
When they finally reach the shipyard’s main doors, Sho reaches inside his pockets before handing Jun a small, thin aluminum chip, presumably with his contact information. Jun takes it gratefully, nodding his thanks, before tucking it inside his coat pocket.  
  
He’s about to leave when he remembers something else. “What do you want me to call you?” he asks Sho, vaguely remembering the affectionate nicknames Nino uses when referring to him.  
  
Sho looks thoughtful for a moment, before answering him with, “Just Sho,” his head inclining towards the chip he just handed Jun, the one safely tucked inside his pocket.  
  
Fine, two can play this game, Jun thinks. “In that case,” he says, and Sho’s eyes immediately focus on his, “call me Jun.”  
  
Then he straightens up and inclines his head as a passable form of goodbye, looking like every bit of the professional he claims to be. He saw Sho’s lips twitching before nodding and with that, Jun turns around and hails a hovercar to take him back to the Praximus metropolis, leaving Sho and his shuttles and the shipyard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The outfit I imagined that Jun's wearing in the shipyard is [this](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B37TxHrCMAI0aT9.jpg). Absolute standout and completely out of place, but it makes him look like a high-earning pleasure model through and through (to me at least), doesn't it?
> 
> Just to clarify, Sho is a labor type of android. I know I only said he's built for fixing shuttles and encoding syntax, but if you want to put a name to it he's a labor model.


	2. We Learn From Each Other

Jun should have expected that he’ll find Nino waiting for him in his place. He should have, but all the shuttle fixing he did made him lose focus and he kind of hates himself (and Sho) for it.  
  
He finds Ninomiya sprawled all over his couch (which definitely costs more than Nino’s spare parts, he’s sure of it), a display pad in hand. He greets Jun with an infuriating cheer of, “Welcome home, Jun-kun!” and Jun considers kicking him out.  
  
“How the hell did you get in?” he asks, and Nino doesn’t even pause the game he’s playing as he says, “Duplicated your keycard ages ago. You didn’t know?”  
  
Jun really feels like strangling him now. “No, I did not,” he replies, saying every word through his teeth, getting pissed by each second that passes. He thinks he should have brought one or two tritanium coils with him back home, he can find other uses for them apart from being essential parts of shuttle repairs. He closes his eyes and counts to ten, trying to regain his patience. This is Nino and Nino is his friend, isn’t he? No matter how much of a thorn he is to Jun’s side most of the time. It doesn’t work and Jun forces himself to open his eyes to glare at Nino’s uninvited presence instead.  
  
Nino turns his head to look at him and just laughs upon seeing his expression. Jun’s close to seething now; he can’t believe Nino actually had the gall to laugh at this time of the night, when he’s clearly trespassing in Jun’s apartment. Jun considers calling the police to get Nino’s ass handed to him but he decides against it in the end. He sighs, hand already flying to his temple. He can already feel the upcoming headache this late-night conversation with Nino will bring.  
  
“So! What did you guys do?” Nino cocks his head at him, looking like every bit of the little shit that he is in Jun’s life. He’s now wiggling his eyebrows at Jun and Jun wonders if Aiba can be really this infuriating, if it was all part of the program or this is just original Nino charm. Either way, he thinks he never did anything truly awful in this short life of his to actually deserve this.  
  
Jun shrugs off the coat and reaches behind his neck to unclasp his necklace. “We fixed shuttles,” he says, deadpan. At the sight of Nino’s eyebrows raising, he smirks. Serves you right, Jun thinks, for trespassing in other people’s apartments when you have a place of your own, all for the purposes of extracting information which obviously can wait till tomorrow.  
  
Nino blinks at him before schooling his features to a mixture of childish innocence and curiosity. “Is that a common euphemism used in Praximus shipyards?” he asks Jun, and this time, Jun responds by throwing his coat in Nino’s direction much to Nino’s laughter. Nino catches the coat before he raises his hands in mock surrender, expression full of glee.  
  
Jun might actually commit murder on a fellow replicant tonight, and in doing so he’ll definitely spend whatever remains of his eleven months in the Praximus local prison, or worse, in the quadrant stargate penitentiary. Though it’s not really a bad way to go, he thinks, as long as he can wipe that expression off Nino’s face.  
  
“Okay, okay,” Nino says, when he apparently can breathe again. “So you fixed a shuttle. Seriously? You spent, what,” he looks at Jun’s chronometer for the time, “approximately six point two hours with Sho-chan,” he smiles, “and all you guys did was to fix a shuttle?”  
  
“There were three,” Jun tells him, as he proceeds to unbutton his black vest. He suddenly remembers Sho’s contact information stored in the aluminum chip, the one he tucked inside his jacket pocket, and he looks at Nino’s direction in alarm.  
  
Too late. Nino already has the chip between his fore and middle fingers, a sly grin on his face.  
  
Jun curses inwardly. Trust Nino to completely violate his privacy by digging in his pockets. It’s a wonder Nino’s not a wanted thief in the quadrant. He can actually pull it off.  
  
And trust Jun to forget about the chip before hurling his coat in Nino’s direction in anger. Shit.  
  
“Stop looking like death, J,” Nino tells him, before chucking the chip in his direction. Jun catches it in his right hand, turning it in his palm to check if it’s still intact. He breathes a sigh of relief once he’s certain it’s still in one piece. It took three malfunctioning circuitry to get this, he thinks. “You have a little over eleven months to go before you are allowed to look like that,” Nino says as he slouches back on Jun’s couch.  
  
“Besides,” Nino continues, “if I wanted Sho-yan’s contact information,” Jun frowns at the new nickname, “it wouldn’t really take me three shuttles.”  
  
That’s it. That does it. This time, Jun really drags Nino out of his living room by the arm and pushes him out of the apartment, Nino’s protests be damned. He sees Nino opening his mouth for probably another snarky remark but Jun shuts the door in his face, enabling double locks via his personal authorization code, something even a keycard duplicate can’t trick.  
  
When he hears a shuffle of movement outside followed by a female computer voice saying, “Authorization not recognized,” while his lock beeping error, he subsequently hears Nino’s howling laughter echoing outside, and Jun thinks that the night isn’t too late for a bottle of wine as a reward for all the things he had to endure today.  
  
In the back of his mind, Jun finds himself believing that if he was to continue this arrangement with Sho, it comes with a Ninomiya snooping around, asking for significant developments and giving the most obscene of suggestions, like a buy one take one promo in which Nino is the take one and you have absolutely no need for the take one, but they still give it you.  
  
He sighs, already making his way to his private cellar. He really needs that wine.  
  
\--  
  
Before Jun goes to bed, he flips the aluminum chip Sho gave him twice, thrice, four times, before finally scanning it with his display pad. Sure enough, a holo transmission of code appears indicating information transfer, before a prompt box pops out and asks Jun for the contact name.  
  
He realizes he still doesn’t know Sho’s last name. Nino never told him (and Jun thinks he’ll choose death by airlock into outer space first before he’ll curb his pride and ask Nino for it), and that tiny, tanned shipyard foreman Ohno never did either. His remaining options are to either ask Aiba about it (Aiba won’t refuse him, he’s certain of that, but if he goes to Aiba then Nino will definitely know about it and he’s not risking that) or work for it and earn it from Sho himself in due time.  
  
He already made a decision as he instructs his display pad that, “‘Sho’ will be just fine,” watching as the interface shines bright green in acknowledgement of the order. He finds himself smiling. “For now.”  
  
He taps a finger on the message icon next to Sho’s name and for a while Jun considers sending him a note similar to the manner he handed Jun the shipyard address. Just a note, an address or worse, a set of coordinates, no details included whatsoever. He almost goes for it, until he remembers that he’s not really fond of that kind of approach. He’s always been the assertive type which makes him really good for his job.  
  
He cancels the message and opts for a holo instead. Be more assertive, he tells himself. When the screen indicates that it’s beginning recording, Jun flashes his pad camera his most charming smile. “Sho-san,” he begins, inclining his head a little, meanwhile putting enough emphasis on every syllable, “I’d like to request your company to this place next week on a Wednesday evening, at 2100 hours.” He’s aware that the formality of the language he uses in the recording is one he commonly uses for his clients, and if Sho is as sharp as he looks, he will undoubtedly catch on to this.  
  
Still, Jun thinks, it’ll be at least entertaining to see Sho, a non-pleasure model but will definitely pass as one roaming about in the pleasure district, in an entirely unfamiliar environment which is similar to what Jun did a few hours ago.  
  
Jun flashes the camera one last smile before saying, “I look forward to seeing you soon,” and he flicks a finger to the side of the pad screen to attach the address of his favorite clothing shop in Praximus, before finally ending the holo recording and sending it to Sho. He thinks it’s only fair that he shows Sho how his job works, how it’s mostly dependent on outward appearances after Sho unprecedentedly imposed on him the repair of three busted flight circuits.  
  
He goes to bed with a smile on his face, feeling incredibly satisfied with himself. It makes tonight’s very unfortunate encounter with Ninomiya almost worth it. Almost.  
  
\--  
  
The evening of Wednesday had Jun standing in front of Starlight Kiss, an establishment that sells, “clothes befitting the Emperor that you are and you pride yourself to be,” according to Nino. This is Jun’s side of Praximus, this side of the city buzzing with life, paying no mind to the darkening skies and the eventual lateness of the hours. He adjusts the nicotine level in his electronic cigarette and takes a drag. Fifty-six seconds to 2100.  
  
The following morning after his holo invitation, Sho simply sent him a typed note of, “All right,” and Jun had the entire yesterday to quell the disappointment he felt about not getting a holo back.  
  
“Did you seriously just asked him to accompany you shopping?” Ninomiya, the ever-nosy bastard that he is, asks Jun when Jun carelessly left his display pad unattended, a mistake he won’t repeat again. “And he actually agreed?” Nino looks surprised, but Jun doesn’t know which one of them Nino can’t believe: him or Sho.  
  
Jun scoffs at him, playing it safe. “Are you doubting how persuasive I can be?”  
  
Nino leers at him. “Started considering my clever suggestions, huh? You should really give the antigrav a shot. That one is responsible for more than one-third of my bank savings.” He wiggles his eyebrows at Jun for effect, and Jun rolls his eyes in response. “You’ll only need your Emperor outfits for the beginning and after that it’s all fun and games.”  
  
Two minutes and twenty-three seconds past 2100 is when he hears a series of light footsteps approaching him. For someone who works at a shipyard, Sho is surprisingly very light on his steps. Or maybe that’s because Jun asked to meet him in one of the very populated places in Praximus metropolis and Sho’s on his guard. Jun didn’t exactly get the luxury of observing how Sho is on his feet the last time they met. He had other things in mind (and even more things to get out of his mind thanks to Nino).  
  
The idea of Sho being a fish out of the water amuses him, and Jun takes one last drag from his electronic cigarette to hide the smile betraying the image he tries very hard to preserve. He turns off the device after one last puff of nicotine, feeling its euphoric effect swimming in his system, effectively calming him.  
  
Sho clears his throat behind him and Jun finally looks at him. “Sorry for being late,” is all he says, looking slightly sheepish, and Jun waves a hand to dismiss any form of apology Sho may have considered adding.  
  
Jun cocks his head and takes in Sho’s appearance: white v-neck, faded jeans, casual sandals that are a bit worn out at the edges. Just like the first time they met. He thinks he made a good decision to invite him here. Not that Sho looks awful in what he’s wearing, because he can actually pull off the white tee and jeans combo without exerting effort and Jun’s kind of envious of him about that, but Jun also wants to see him wearing something different, something that will add to the mystery that Sho seems to be fond of surrounding himself with.  
  
Jun decides to make things easier for Sho and postpone the revenge for some other time. “I’m going to teach you how to dress,” he says, gesturing to the entrance of Starlight Kiss for effect.  
  
Sho raises an eyebrow. “I can dress myself,” he defends himself, and Jun almost smiles at the retort. But since Jun is a professional and they’re currently in his turf, he doesn’t.  
  
“For the shipyards, yes,” Jun agrees, giving Sho another once over, “for the metropolis, you need help.” He tilts his chin at Sho, waiting for a comeback or a cleverly structured refusal regarding what he’s currently offering.  
  
Sho simply looks at him, expression unreadable. “I won’t end up looking like you did in the shipyard, will I?” is the only thing he asks, and Jun narrows his eyes. To his assessment, he looked fine, more than fine during that time in fact, and he’s pretty certain that 89.3% of the glances thrown his way during his shipyard stay were all under the appreciative category.  
  
He feels slightly insulted now.  
  
“I looked just fine back then,” he says, making the slight irritation evident in his voice. Sho, for his part, doesn’t even look intimidated.  
  
He simply tilts his head at Jun. “More than fine, in fact,” and it’s an unexpected compliment, so Jun finds himself frowning. He didn’t think Sho was capable of compliments, especially concerning Jun, because his internal assessment of the looks Sho threw his way that night was a combination of 27.3% fascination, 27.9% calm and collected and unfussed, and the remaining 44.8% is something his systems couldn’t define exactly. Back then, that is.  
  
He thinks he’s beginning to understand what the almost forty-five percent constituted of and it sends a shiver down his spine.  
  
“But still not fitting for a shipyard,” Sho finishes, and this time, Jun doesn’t suppress his lips curling to a smile.  
  
“Well, you didn’t exactly give me an itinerary,” he accuses Sho, but without any vitriol in it.  
  
Sho simply tilts his head in agreement at that, dashes of amusement clearly dancing in his eyes. Someday, Jun thinks, someday he’ll get Sho to give him a smile. He can’t be that elusive, that difficult. It’s a challenge Jun can’t wait to surpass.  
  
For tonight, Jun is simply content to lend a hand. If he gets more than that, well, that’s something he’ll keep for himself till his expiry date.  
  
“Is this your revenge for last week?” Sho asks and Jun thinks he can detect some of Sho’s amusement in his voice.  
  
Getting there, Jun, he tells himself.  
  
Jun simply leads Sho to the entrance of the store, holding the door open for him. “I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says, his expression full of mock innocence. He may have learned that one by hanging out with Nino even if that’s against his will for more than three-fourths of the time.  
  
Sho purses his lips at that, and this time Jun knows it’s not imagination on his part when his system interprets it as an almost-smile.  
  
\--  
  
Sho, apparently, has a fashion sense that greatly differs from Jun’s. Which is what Jun expected, honestly, because Sho has this unexplainable fondness for white tees and jeans, but he didn’t expect that they differ that much.  
  
He tries to coordinate an outfit for Sho, only to have him purse his lips in thought and search for clothes in different styles altogether. Jun would be annoyed, but he’s starting to see a side of Sho’s meticulousness that doesn’t involve wires and circuits, so he grabs the opportunity and lets Sho choose for himself, though there are times Jun scrunches his nose in disapproval (double gray parkas? The horror) and stares at Sho with wide eyes.  
  
When Sho picks up a fluffy hat that supposedly also functions as an adequate bicycle helmet, Jun groans. “You cannot be serious with that,” he says, slightly exasperated, and he sees amusement dancing in Sho’s eyes. Jun crosses his arms. “You’re not getting that, not with me around,” he says, dragging Sho away from the shelf, his hand firm on Sho’s upper arm. The contact is scalding, but Jun doesn’t let go until they’re away from the fluffy hats.  
  
Nearly two hours (one hour, fifty-two minutes, and sixteen seconds, Jun’s mind tells him) later, Sho picks up a pair of sweats printed in such a way that they will look like jeans from afar, and Jun finally settles for a stern, “No, absolutely not,” in Sho’s direction, and Sho shoots him a look.  
  
“They look comfortable,” he tells Jun, as if that’s more than enough to change Jun’s perception of such atrocities.  
  
It’s the 23rd century, Jun thinks, his patience wearing thin. Whoever thought that fake jeans are revolutionary ought to be executed via airlock into outer space, without a spacesuit to let them just freeze and explode there. It will be done for the sake of justice, to restore the disrupted balance of the universe.  
  
Jun raises an eyebrow at Sho before picking up a pair of cropped pants, raising it for Sho to see. “The reason I brought you here is to stop you for getting things like that,” he tilts his head at the horrible, horrible sweats in Sho’s hands, “and to make you wear things like this,” he gestures to the cream-colored pair he’s holding.  
  
Sho narrows his eyes for a moment, before sighing and returning the monstrosity he’s holding to the shelf he got it from. Jun feels like smiling when Sho takes the cropped pants from him, but since Matsumoto Jun is a professional and he’s in his element right now, he still doesn’t. He picks up a couple of tops from the side, along with a blue cardigan, and shoves them all in Sho’s hands, before pushing him to the direction of the dressing room. Jun picks up a pair of sneakers he deemed suitable enough and shoves them under the door of the dressing room, hearing Sho squeak in surprise.  
  
With no one around to see, that’s when Jun allows himself to smile.  
  
While Sho tries out the clothes Jun picked for him (Jun tries not to look very pleased about succeeding), he wanders around the shop to look for suitable accessories. He’s eyeing a particular necklace made from the troostite deposit mined only in the distant colony of Regulus XII, noting that its redness is making it stand out from the rest of the displays. Before he can decide against it he purchases the necklace, pocketing the package for later.  
  
Sho comes out after four minutes and twelve seconds, looking very much unlike the shipyard engineer Jun has become acquainted with, and Jun nods in approval after looking at him from head to toe more than once.  
  
Obviously, he has the better taste here. He finds he can gloat about that for the rest of the night especially now that Sho can definitely pass for a pleasure model. Jun thinks that if Sho puts his mind to it, he can be someone big, someone well-known in a matter of months, someone Nino will undoubtedly hate and accuse for stealing clients.  
  
Sho dismisses Jun with a wave of his hand when Jun offers his credits, and Jun nods to himself before backing off, thinking he can definitely take a hint. Sho obviously doesn’t want to owe him, and Jun’s fine with that. Let him act disgruntled and detached, Jun thinks, as long as he’s wearing things that won’t make Jun run to the nearest spacedock out of fright.  
  
Jun thinks he will rather ship himself off to Andromeda or somewhere else than be seen walking with a man wearing fake denim sweats. He has a reputation to maintain after all.  
  
When Sho turns around after probably blowing his credits (Jun didn’t exactly pick the cheap stuff, he picks them according to what he feels, never mind the price), Jun pulls the package he purchased earlier out of his pocket and hands it to Sho, who looks at him questioningly.  
  
Jun shrugs. “Something to remember tonight by,” he says, giving Sho a pointed look to just take the box and don’t dwell on it too much. Sho does after a few agonizing seconds, and he frowns when he finally examines what’s inside.  
  
“This,” Sho tries, but Jun cuts him off with a, “is just a necklace, nothing more. I’m not asking you wear it, that’s up to you.  I just thought it’ll be fitting along with what you’re wearing for tonight,” hoping it won’t give away how nervous he feels about the possibility of Sho declining.  
  
Sho looks at him and for a moment, Jun is actually terrified of what he’s going to say next, but he certainly didn’t expect the, “I was just going to say that this is troostite,” among all the possible rebuffs his head came up with, and Jun relaxes.  
  
“Thought that’s just right up your alley,” Jun explains, trying to play it cool. He hates how Sho can catch him off-guard, how he can make Jun’s brain formulate extremes only for them not to happen at all. Not even Nino can do that, and Jun has known Nino for, what, almost three years now.  
  
He’s only known Sho for two weeks, and he’s starting to feel alarmed.  
  
Sho fiddles with the troostite for a moment, before closing the box and saying, “Thank you,” his eyes looking most sincere. He’s not smiling, but his eyes look genuinely grateful, and Jun just nods. “Shall we?” he asks Sho, gesturing to the exit. When Sho looks at him quizzically, Jun explains, “The night is still young and the metropolis hardly rests.”  
  
Sho sighs, and it almost sounds like one of defeat, and Jun counts it as a yes, whatever you say, lead the way kind of sigh. He thinks he’s starting to figure Sho out, that he may not be as immune to Jun’s charms as Jun initially gathered, and the idea pleases him enough that he spends the rest of the night in Sho’s company, finally smiling.  
  
\--  
  
He and Sho spend the following weeks taking turns in showing something to the other. Just four days after Sho’s initiation to the more appearance-conscious corners of Praximus, Jun in return got an almost full course on shuttle work, probably as a form of revenge.  
  
Now Jun may not be interested in shuttles that much, but he considers them a part of Sho, so if he exerts extra effort each time Sho teaches him something new, he doesn’t dwell on the idea too much (or at least he tries not to because it doesn’t help him sleep at night, that much is sure).  
  
At one time, they’re both bent over a sensor ray console (which, Jun admits, is far less taxing to fix than flight circuits) when Sho suddenly says, “Sakurai,” and for a moment, Jun just looks at him, obviously confused.  
  
“That’s my last name,” Sho explains, before snapping a faulty wiring and rerouting it to the main frame, like he never said anything at all. Jun recovers from the initial shock, and the day ends with him updating Sho’s contact information in his access pad, finally knowing what to say when the same, monotonous female computer voice prompts him with, “Name?” the same question it asked him two point seven weeks ago.  
  
The days pass and Sho teaches him how to reroute a busted engine wire, while Jun teaches Sho how to speak a couple of off-world languages he learned from his clients: Omega, Cygnus, as well as that unknown language Nino taught him with the explanation of, “It’s what will get you out of trouble, and I don’t just mean trouble, I mean the deep shit kind of trouble.” Jun doubts Sho will ever find himself in such a situation, but it never hurts to be prepared and to expect the unexpected.  
  
In their linguistics lesson is when Jun finds out that Sho is endlessly fascinated with the idea of syntax to the point it extends to their language sessions. Of course, Jun already knows that Sho loves the idea of order, it’s evident in how meticulous he is in inputting subroutines and lines and lines of intricate code. When Sho was teaching Jun how to reroute an upgrade, he was hovering as Jun worked on it to the point it almost distracted Jun, but he aced it and it earned him a nod of acknowledgement from Sho.  
  
So naturally, when Jun teaches him the syntax of Omega and how it differs from the standard language they use in Praximus, Sho makes him repeat it till he’s sure he got it. Jun has always admired Sho’s dedication, but it’s something to see that not only Sho is a dedicated teacher to Jun, he’s also an equally dedicated student. Jun finds himself very much pleased with that discovery.  
  
When Jun is teaching Sho about the morphology of Cygnus, which involves a lot of ‘o’ shaped intonations, he makes sure Sho does a lot of jaw exercises before they begin. Sho may not be much of a perfectionist, but Jun is and Jun is handling the reins, so really, it’s his call.  
  
It’s also when Jun finds out that Sho can’t exactly move his jaw from side to side, and the first time they attempt to do it and Sho can’t, Jun reaches out with both hands and tries to help him move it. Sho draws back a little, surprise on his face, but Jun doesn’t let it stop him despite the fact that it felt like touching a hot plate, and that’s how he ends up giggling over the reality that Sho has no voluntary control regarding most of his joints.  
  
Jun proves this again when he offers to teach Sho the basics of yoga, and Sho just stares at him like he just said he’s heading for Earth tomorrow or probably to the most obscure regions of the Orion Nebula. Playing innocent, Jun simply asks, “What?” and Sho looks troubled for a moment that he ends up biting his lower lip.  
  
“I don’t think I can do that,” Sho admits to him in a small voice, and this time, Jun really laughs, eyes nearly watering.  
  
Sho frowns at him, already aware that Jun knows how stiff he can be; that the reason Jun wants him to do yoga is precisely because he can’t. Finally, he sighs, “You can’t be serious,” already defeated, and Jun simply offers his hand and leads Sho to the nearby yoga mat.  
  
That becomes the night wherein Jun selfishly indulges himself in touching Sho, guiding his limbs to the proper position, the night wherein Jun delights himself with the sounds Sho’s groans of combined pain and effort. When he’s finally alone with the yoga mat folded in the corner, it becomes the first night that he allows himself to wonder how Sho will sound like if he has his hands in places other than Sho’s extremities.  
  
Jun wakes up the following morning feeling like he never slept at all, the sides of his legs sticky, and he blames yoga for all of it. He heads for the sonic showers, furious with himself, but his head apparently can’t forget how it felt to run his fingers on Sho’s skin, that his hand finds its way around his cock, wrapping tightly before pulling, friction making him moan.  
  
If he comes with Sho’s name spilling from his lips, thankfully no one is there to see or hear it.  
  
Sho’s revenge for the yoga session is to have Jun do the work that will dirty his clothes the most, which is fixing a shuttlecraft leak. Jun has long abandoned the fashionable clothes befitting his model, opting for a casual shirt and a pair of simple jeans (he thinks he picked up Sho’s fondness for them) whenever Sho asks him to go to the shipyard, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t refine his looks to perfection every time, because he does. Looks constitute 78.6% of his popularity, after all.  
  
Sho looks so smug when he hears Jun’s pointed _tch_ at the sight of his fingers dirtied, so smug that Jun wants to impose yoga on him again just to get even. There’s grease on Jun’s arms and a streak of it on his left pant leg, and Jun feels filthy, so filthy that when the work is done, he thinks Sho senses how uncomfortable he is in his own skin that he lets Jun go after fixing just one leak, which is truly unusual.  
  
Because Sho seems to like having Jun help him around, that every time it’s Sho’s turn to teach something new he keeps Jun for as long as possible by working on different kinds of repairs in one night, something he can obviously work on for the rest of the week. Sometimes, when there’s not much work left for the both of them, he takes twice as long just to finish a repair (Jun knows because he times himself when Sho makes him do similar things).  
  
Not that Jun’s complaining about that development, after all, he also has his fair share of selfishness every time it’s his turn to call the shots.  
  
That night, before Jun hails a hovercraft back to the city, Sho hands him a rolled package and tells him to open it when he gets home. It turns out to be a shipyard jumpsuit uniform with Jun’s name on it. Not the name he goes by when he does his work, not ‘Matsumoto Jun’, or ‘Matsumoto’, but simply ‘Jun’, and Jun thinks he’s starting to get past Sho’s defenses, that Sho’s gradually lowering his walls.  
  
He makes sure to bring it with him the next time Sho invites him back to the shipyard, and he takes note of how Sho seems to be delighted that he brought it with him, that Jun wore it when they’re finally working on engineering anomalies. He doesn’t smile though, just nods at Jun in acknowledgement and proceeds to have the both of them do the really intricate upgrades and recalibrations, the highly advanced stuff.  
  
Jun is a fast learner, and soon enough Sho decides to put his skills to the test by letting him fix a busted transmitter, all under time pressure. Jun finishes the job in exactly seven minutes and fifty-one seconds, and he tilts his head at Sho who simply looks at him with a glint in his eye.  
  
As a form of congratulations, the next time they meet, which is at this fancy restaurant in the Praximus metropolis known for specializing in Andromedan cuisine, Sho wears the necklace Jun bought for him that time at Starlight Kiss, much to Jun’s surprise. He never wore it, not even when Jun gave it to him. Sho seems to be delighted by Jun’s expression, because he touches the necklace for a moment without looking away from Jun’s eyes.  
  
And yet, despite these seemingly significant developments in their arrangement (Jun thinks it’s significant that Sho no longer shies away from the brushes of fingers that Jun does deliberately, that he responds to Jun’s holos with a holo of his own 56.4% of the time, and it’s definitely significant that Sho wore the necklace), Sho still hasn’t called him Jun, nor gave him a full smile.  
  
The most he got was a slight curling of lips when they were trying to diagnose a shuttlecraft problem and Jun suggested the right thing (it was a radiator overheating). And it’s always Matsumoto-san whenever they meet for the first time in whatever arrangement they scheduled for that night, and Matsumoto-kun whenever they’re in the shipyard.  
  
Never Jun. He’s starting to wonder how long it will take to get Sho say his name, his actual name, considering Jun’s limited time.  
  
He hopes he has long enough to see that day.


	3. Three Years

Praximus V, as the name implies, is the fifth established off-world settlement in the Praximus Stargate in Triangulum and boasts about being one of the contemporary off-world colonies ever established. So naturally, Praximus V is currently being used as a stop-over for those who want to head-off to Messier 81, since Messier has a few more chunks of rocks with no permanent settlements established yet. Colonization began with the Orion Nebula eighty-two years ago before quickly expanding to the Andromeda Galaxy. When even Andromeda isn’t enough to contain all the scientific curiosity, colonists brought themselves to Triangulum.  
  
And now it’s the Messier 81 they have their sights on. Most of the colonists refer to it as Bode’s Galaxy, its other Earth name, and replicants refer to it as Messier or Messier 81, or sometimes, NGC-3031, its more technical name for the more technical replicants like Sho.  
  
Jun calls it depending on whose company he’s with, so he knows all the names.  
  
Most of the freight and passenger shuttles heading directly to the galaxy encounter a couple of malfunctions on the way, from a simple refuel to sometimes a complete shuttle refit, which gives the main shipyard a lot of work to do and the Praximus pleasure district a lot of stranded, potential clients to entertain in the meantime.  
  
It also means Sho and Jun get less time to meet, which, apparently, does something to his mood because Nino (who else?) notices it and calls him out on it one time. In Jun’s defense, he wasn’t that aware of it until Nino said something about it.  
  
“It seems,” Nino begins, and Jun downs his drink in one go, slamming the glass on the surface of the table with force. They’re in this obscure bar Nino likes to visit, and apparently frequently at that. They both just finished entertaining their own share clients for tonight and Nino, all of a sudden and entirely uncharacteristic of him, invites Jun for a drink. His treat, he tells Jun, purely out of the goodness of his heart. Jun thinks either he got paid really well for his last client session or he has something else in mind.  
  
Not certain of either option, Jun accepts. He can totally use a drink. Or two, or more than that, provided Nino’s the one shedding credits. It’s a once in a lifetime kind of thing, Nino spending money voluntarily.  
  
He scowls at the taste, looking at Nino. “It seems like you don’t share my elation and enthusiasm over this sudden development in the business,” Nino continues. “So what is it? Your share of clients finally woke up from their delusion and stopped fawning over you?”  
  
Jun just shrugs noncommittally, asking the bartender for another glass of vodka. He twirls the shot glass in his hand, wishing it’ll work wonders and distract him from everything that is happening. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Nino gesture to the bartender for two more rounds, and Jun nods his head at Nino as a form of thanks.  
  
Nino fixes him a look. “Now I know something’s definitely wrong,” he says to Jun, and Jun frowns. “You don’t thank me unless something’s obviously up.”  
  
Perceptive bastard, Jun thinks. He kind of blames the alcohol in his system, but the slow burn of it in his throat is a temporary reprieve he thinks he needs. Nino nudges him with his shoe. “Seriously J, why are you moping? Is it Sho? Did he break your heart and board a shuttle to Centaurus?”  
  
Jun nudges Nino back. “He didn’t board a shuttle, asshole,” he tells Nino, hoping it’ll be enough to shut him up. “And Centaurus is still too fucking far. Not even our significant developments in technology can make it there yet.” He reaches for the next vodka shot and downs it in one gulp. It burns, it fucking burns, but the feeling of it is making Jun less controlled over his sensations, dulls whatever weird thing he’s feeling. He can’t define it. His systems aren’t programmed to define it, he thinks.  
  
Nino snorts. “But he did break your heart?” and Jun rolls his eyes.  
  
“No, he didn’t,” he denies, before focusing his full attention to Nino. “How did you get to know him anyway? And don’t say Aiba, we both know Aiba’s probably collecting rock samples in the seventh moon of this goddamn asteroid chunk and I’m really not in the mood to find him and ask him about it personally, so I’m asking you.”  
  
This time Nino laughs, slapping his own knee repeatedly. “Oh, Jun-kun!” he exclaims, full of so much glee. “Jun-kun, you have it bad!” Nino continues, and Jun hates him, hates every fiber of Nino’s being and he thinks if he has an access to an airlock right now, he’d chuck Nino to the edges of unexplored space without hesitation and definitely without a spacesuit. He hopes the way he glares right now conveys that.  
  
“What are you on about, Ninomiya?” he asks, already feeling a faint throbbing in his temple. He wishes he can transfer the impending headache to Nino instead. Maybe that will shut him up and will stop him from being annoying.  
  
But Jun knows, deep inside him, that not even Praximus getting split in half or being attacked by a renegade alien armada is going to stop Nino once he figured something out. It’s the Aiba trademark.  
  
Nino just smiles at him, the impish grin he saves for Jun when he’s feeling like an evil mastermind with an equally evil scheme. Jun won’t put it past him because the only reason Nino’s not a criminal is that he likes getting credits more than spending them, and being an outlaw surely involves a lot of spending, a lot of people to bribe in order to stay off the radar. After all, bribery never comes cheap.  
  
He knows because Nino is the one who told him about that, that Nino could be a great, renowned criminal across the galaxies, a famed outlaw of outer space if only he liked the thrill it can offer more than he likes money and himself.  
  
“Such a real shame, isn’t it?” Nino said at that time. “Seeing as I have such potential.”  
  
Jun watches as Nino whips out his own access pad and starts typing a message. He doesn’t get to see to whom Nino sends the message to because Nino’s fingers are too fast and Jun’s the one drinking, shot after shot, to the point it takes extra effort to follow movement with his eyes.  
  
Nino keeps the grin in place, ordering round after round for Jun, never partaking from any himself. Jun loses count of how many shots he had, and vaguely, the computer part of him notes he’s probably at his ninth or tenth when someone takes the seat to his right.  
  
Jun turns, and he tries to gain control over his features to frown effectively at Aiba’s smiling face.  
  
“Hello, Jun-chan!” Aiba says in a voice full of energy that isn’t appropriate for the late hour. When Jun looks at Nino for an explanation he sees his fellow replicant hiding his giggles at the crook of his elbow, a habit he does when Jun looks too murderous and Nino, being Nino, instead of running for cover like what most people will do, chooses to laugh at his face.  
  
Jun turns back to Aiba, making sure he still looks menacing despite the alcohol preventing most of motor coordination. “Why are you here?”  
  
Aiba’s response is to just smile wider. “Nino called me here, that’s why! And because I missed you!” he says excitedly, hitting Jun’s arm over and over again. “I haven’t seen you for the longest time! You never reply to me with a holo.”  
  
Jun buries his face in the hand that’s not holding the shot glass. When he glances at Nino’s direction, the fucker is chuckling to himself with his chin plopped in his hand. Jun will shove him out of an airlock one of these days, murder charges be damned.  
  
Aiba pokes him on the ribs and Jun retaliates by elbowing him. “Seriously, stop that, you know I hate that!” Jun tells him, patience disappearing rapidly. Aiba raises his hands in mock surrender, his lips pouting, and Jun, for a moment and against his better judgment (he blames the vodka), feels sorry for him.  
  
“So, what’s got your circuits on overdrive this time, Jun-chan?” Aiba asks, nudging Jun with his elbow. Jun doesn’t feel like answering that because one, he seriously doesn’t know what exactly is the reason, and two, he doesn’t understand the nickname Aiba uses on him, so he simply shrugs and takes another shot, wincing at the burn of it.  
  
“He met Sho-yan,” he hears Nino say to his left, and Jun fixes him a death glare, which, unfortunately, has no effect on Nino at all because Nino just looks triumphant and he still has that annoying smile on his face.  
  
“Really? Huh!” Aiba says to his right, and Jun can feel the enthusiasm radiating off the man in waves. How can a person contain this much excitement and energy in them, Jun will never know, but he supposes that’s a trait unique to Aiba alone. Jun’s human clients aren’t exactly bundles of joys, and his human non-clients are almost the same in that aspect.  
  
He hears Nino hum in agreement, and soon Nino’s laying out the details. “Courtesy of yours truly, of course. But anyway, six weeks into their arrangement and J is moping already.” Nino peers at him. “Was I right about the six weeks?” he confirms, and Jun’s mouth answers for him before he can help it.  
  
“Six point six.” Nino howls in laughter.  
  
“Sorry, sorry, six point six,” Nino says, sarcastically stressing out each word. Jun wants to kill him. “Six point six weeks of association, Aiba-shi, and he’s like this already.” Nino extends a palm at Jun’s direction for effect. Jun doesn’t even understand what ‘this’ supposedly means, but Aiba doesn’t seem to share that confusion at all.  
  
For his part, Aiba seems to already know what’s going on. He just tilts his head. “What kind of arrangement?” he asks, and Jun wants to curse him for catching on to the important detail. He’s as sharp as Nino, and Jun thinks that the universe must hate him so much to have him trapped in between the sharpest replicant he’s ever known and the man who created said replicant.  
  
Like maker, like android, indeed.  
  
“Well,” Nino begins, throwing glances at Jun before proceeding, “I have no idea what exactly it is they did for six point six weeks, only that J hasn’t fucked Sho-yan yet,” he put so much emphasis on the ‘yet’ and this earns a glare from Jun, which Nino simply dismisses with a wave of his hand.  
  
Jun refuses to look at any of them. “We hang out,” he explains, and neither Nino nor Aiba seem to buy that, much to his chagrin. Nino chuckles at his side and Aiba just looks at him with a smile that speaks volumes.  
  
“You don’t just ‘hang out’ with someone and look suddenly murderous when you don’t see them for the next few days,” Nino says, and Aiba giggles.  
  
If Jun’s going to commit a crime tonight, he’ll definitely be sent to the stargate penitentiary for double homicide, but hell, he’s starting to think it might actually be worth it.  
  
Nino asks the bartender for another round, one for Jun and one for Aiba, which Aiba takes with a thank you thrown in Nino’s direction.  
  
“You’re lucky there’s this billionaire colonist from Earth that has an antigrav kink and thought I was the guy for the job,” Nino says, which explains his generosity for tonight. Nino’s a stingy bastard, and Jun doesn’t think that’s part of the program because Aiba’s very generous and is the complete opposite of Nino whenever credits are involved.  
  
Still, tonight was apparently a high-earning night for Ninomiya, so either he’s really good or antigrav is seriously that high-paying. Jun hasn’t found that out for himself yet, so he isn’t sure.  
  
“What’s with you and antigrav anyway?” he asks, and Nino just smiles, deceptively full of saccharine.  
  
“Try it with Sho-chan sometime,” Nino answers, and Jun wants to kick him so he does. His foot makes contact with Nino’s leg but Nino doesn’t even spare the impact a glance.  
  
The little shit.  
  
Jun really hates him. And Aiba who’s laughing at his right. And his life too, but he mostly hates Nino.  
  
“Anyway,” Nino says, bringing them back to the topic at hand. “So they met, and Jun-kun here wants to know how you met Sho-chan, so that’s why I called you.”  
  
Aiba places his drink at the table. “Sho-chan, huh?” he asks wistfully, looking absolutely nostalgic. Jun wonders if everybody gets to call Sho like that. Everybody except him, apparently. He can’t find it in himself to call Sho as ‘Sho-chan’. It’s always Sho-san in holo transmissions and Sho-kun whenever they spend time together. Somehow, he’s reminded of that small foreman called Ohno (who serves as Jun’s tour guide around the shipyard if Sho forgets that he’s supposed to meet Jun) and Jun remembers him referring to Sho as Sho-chan as well from time to time.  
  
Seriously, everybody calls him Sho-chan and Jun still hasn’t earned that right despite their six point six-week arrangement (so far). It annoys him, somehow.  
  
“I met Sho-chan three years ago,” Aiba says to Jun as an explanation, and somehow, the alcohol in Jun’s system suddenly ebbed that he can feel himself gradually sobering up.  
  
“Three years?” Jun clarifies, and Aiba nods. “Yeah, almost immediately after I retired from the corporation and got myself here, along with my most finest work right there.” Aiba points to Nino, who dutifully salutes in their way.  
  
Jun frowns, but not because of Aiba’s pitiful grammar. Sho never told him his incept date, and if Aiba is telling the truth (Jun knows that he is, Aiba won’t lie about this), that means Sho’s time is probably as limited as Jun’s, give or take a few months.  
  
Which would explain the memory lapses. He suddenly remembers the first time he went to the shipyard, how surprised Sho looked when Jun showed up on their appointed meeting time and place. That also explains Sho’s lateness in 27.6% of their meetings. Jun has never known of replicants capable of being late, that is until he met Sho. Sho is sometimes one or two minutes late when Jun asks for his company. Not much to note had they been human, but they’re not human so accuracy itself is part of their essence because it’s the computer part of them that makes them so astute.  
  
A single lapse in accuracy can mean a lot of things.  
  
And sometimes, there are instances when Sho takes twice as long in fixing a minute shuttlecraft problem, something Jun didn’t pay much attention to at that time because all he could focus on was having to spend a longer time with Sho. Jun is starting to think he knows why Sho’s teaching him everything he knows. It sends the feeling of dread in his stomach, a feeling he never thought himself capable of.  
  
Jun has heard of stories how it happens for all replicants, that when the end is close they simply start to waver at the edges, their power source gradually depleting which results in their systems gradually malfunctioning, till they simply drop dead to their feet, their program finally shutting itself down. It’s what makes them lesser than humans despite being capable of becoming more human than humans themselves. The four-year lifespan of a replicant is exact to the mark.  
  
He turns to Ninomiya and sees him smiling. “Finally caught on, have you?” Nino asks, and Jun narrows his eyes.  
  
“Is that why you set up that meeting?” he asks Nino. It’s becoming harder to breathe, Jun realizes. He has so much pent-up energy inside him and the alcohol slowly leaving his system only heightened his sensation of it.  
  
Nino smiles wider. “Partly,” he answers, before his expression turns completely serious. “Mostly because you two are the most wound up replicants I’ve ever met in my life and you both still don’t know the joys of life even if you’re both running out of it.”  
  
Jun catches on to Nino’s bait immediately. “How long does he have?” he asks, and Nino just shrugs and points to Aiba, who’s now fiddling with his shot glass.  
  
Jun turns to Aiba, waiting for a response. All of Aiba’s excitement from earlier disappeared, and he looks grave, like he’d rather be in someplace else and Jun fears for the worst. When Aiba meets Jun’s eyes, Jun holds his breath for whatever he’s going to say.  
  
“I can’t tell you that,” Aiba says, and he looks as if he’s so sorry that he can’t tell Jun any more.  
  
Jun frowns. “What do you mean you can’t tell me? You’re a former bioengineer,” he points out, and he realizes it’s a low blow because he suddenly feels Nino’s grip on his arm, and when he turns, he sees Nino’s eyes looking panicked, his head keeping on shaking in obvious disapproval.  
  
Aiba just exhales beside him, looking very much unlike the man who entered the bar with a spring in his step some forty-five minutes ago. He simply looks defeated, resigned, and Jun wants to kick himself for saying such things without thinking, for making Aiba look far from the Aiba he’s come to know.  
  
“Sorry,” he mutters, and Aiba just nods in acknowledgement.  
  
He feels Nino loosen his grip on him, and for a while none of them speak. The bar plays a slow melody of Terran descent, its tune lulling the three of them to a false sense of tranquility. The computer in Jun dates it back to mid-2020s, and it helps with Jun’s headache, most of what he drank already disappearing from his system, making him more alert, more sensitive to everything around him.  
  
It also means he feels like absolute shit for saying such an insensitive thing.  
  
His computer part tells him that their silence is now stretching for four point six minutes and counting, and Jun clears his throat to break it. He’s unsure of what to say, only that he needs to do something about the uncomfortable silence he inadvertently brought upon them.  
  
He doesn’t hide his surprise when he hears Aiba speak up.  
  
“I chose this, you know?” he tells Jun or Nino or the both of them, Jun doesn’t exactly know, but he listens because he owes Aiba that. He owes Aiba his undivided attention after Aiba forgave him without a second thought despite his half-assed apology. Jun meant it, he truly feels sorry, but he was inadequate in conveying just how much and he feels guilty about it.  
  
Aiba fiddles with his glass and Nino gestures at the bartender for another round. Aiba raises the drink in Nino’s direction in thanks, and continues, “I chose this life in this colony, some two million light years away from Earth.”  
  
“Two point seven,” Nino murmurs from Jun’s left, and it removes a bit of the tension from earlier. Jun looks at him gratefully, and Aiba simply gives them a small smile before turning back to his drink.  
  
“I had to get away from it,” Aiba says, and now he’s not looking at either Jun or Nino. Jun can see how much it pains him to say it and that makes Jun feel worse having been the cause of it. Nino, being ever perceptive, probably senses Jun’s guilt and he gives Jun’s knee a squeeze as if to say, don’t think on it too much.  
  
“I had to leave. The corporation at first,” Aiba continues, staring at his own reflection from the shot glass. “And after that, even Earth itself became a painful reminder of what I wasn’t able to do, of what I was incapable of doing. I just couldn’t take it, you know?” he clenches one of his hands and Jun grabs Aiba’s wrist, assuring Aiba in a similar manner as Nino did to him earlier.  
  
Aiba exhales. “They wanted me to scrap Nino,” and Jun is so surprised because he never knew this side of the story that he automatically looks at Nino to gauge his expression. Nino has a small smile on his face, but it’s far from the usual cocky smirks he shoots Jun’s way when he’s feeling particularly smug. It’s very far from that and Jun can’t place it.  
  
“They wanted me to scrap him and everyone else in the same series as him. They all had names, every single one of them,” Aiba continues, despite his voice cracking. “I didn’t make them all, we were a team. I was part of a team and in that team I built Nino, poured my humanity into him like the others did, and by the end, they wanted us to deliver them all in the scrap heap.”  
  
Jun doesn’t know any of this. He only knows that Aiba left the Kitagawa Corporation because he ceased believing in something he used to believe in, but he never knew exactly what that was.  
  
Until now. Jun still doesn’t understand why Aiba’s telling him all of this, but he waits and lets Aiba talk, patiently listening to Aiba’s side of the story, shedding some light to Nino’s past that Jun never bothered to ask despite their two point five years of association.  
  
“They wanted to scrap everyone,” Aiba tells them, and from his position, Jun can see his lips quivering. “All because the other team developed a better model,” he says before taking a shot, twirling the glass in his hand after.  
  
Suddenly, it hits Jun. Shit.  
  
“Me,” Jun whispers, wide-eyed. Aiba nods without looking at him, and on his left, Nino gives him a pat on the back. “I was that development.”  
  
“Can you imagine,” Aiba says, his eyes watering now, “having to dismantle something you already gave a life to, something you shared a portion of yourself to? All because some other guys did a better job according to the corporation standards? Can you imagine doing all of that and not letting it get to you because it is, as they told me, ‘Part of your job, Aiba-kun,’ thinking it’ll make me feel better afterwards? Can you imagine them saying to you, ‘They’re just robots, you’re not really committing murder,’ when I protested and told them that I won’t do it?”  
  
Aiba’s voice finally cracks and Jun grabs his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. He doesn’t know what else to do. He looks at Nino and Nino simply nods as if to tell him that what he’s doing for now is enough. When Aiba squeezes back, it’s then that Jun knows that Nino is right.  
  
Aiba takes deep breaths before continuing, his grip on Jun never slacking. He looks at Jun before saying, “So I left. I told the corporation I’m going to dismantle Nino myself then I brought us here, two point seven million light years away from Earth, and I altered Nino’s program in such a way that he’ll only activate once he touches the Praximus soil.”  
  
From his left, Jun sees Nino looking at Aiba with a fondness he seems to save only for his maker, and Jun names it as gratefulness on Nino’s part. Nino owes Aiba his life, his entire life on Praximus is all because Aiba refused to cut the wire, refused to do what was part of his job description according to the corporation. Aiba even made sure Nino will have no firsthand account of whatever happened on Earth, and Jun thinks he’ll never know anyone capable of such kindness, such selflessness. It’s what makes Aiba Aiba, and what makes Nino Aiba’s. He now sees things in a different light.  
  
Nino came to be because Aiba’s far more human compared to every human being they might find on Earth.  
  
Jun realizes then that he is the reason they’re both here, and yet he repays their kindness with more cruelty on his part, with his careless words and insensitive actions.  
  
He feels Nino nudge him on his side. “It’s not your fault,” he tells Jun, and Jun marvels at how perceptive Nino is. And they call Jun the better model? He feels like laughing at the idea.  
  
“But it is,” Jun insists, and this time, it’s Aiba squeezing his hand. “They were going to dismantle you because of me just like what they did to others,” he tells Nino, and he looks at Aiba before saying, “You became a former bioengineer because of me.” He feels immense guilt, like it can crush him any moment and leave him boneless, a shell of whatever it is he used to be. Is this how guilt feels for humans, he wonders? Whoever programmed him to feel like utter shit once he finds out the reality behind everything did an excellent job at it.  
  
Nino snorts beside him. “It’s the corporation’s shitty excuse for monitoring progress via development compartmentalizing that did this,” he snaps, looking at Jun in the eye. “Not you, not the guys who made you, but the corporation.” He points a finger at Jun’s face. “You hear me, Matsumoto? It’s not your fucking fault.”  
  
On his right, he feels Aiba let go of his hand to squeeze his shoulder. “Programmed him to be as good as that so you can already bet that I’m with him,” Aiba says, a ghost of a smile on his face. “Besides, didn’t I already tell you? I chose this.”  
  
“So really,” Nino says, stretching his limbs, “cut it with the self-righteous bullshit. So what if old man Kitagawa thought you were better than me? We all know that’s far from the truth,” he raises an eyebrow at Jun, his lips curling, his smugness from earlier returning rapidly. “I mean, I’m not the one moping here over someone, am I?”  
  
This time Aiba laughs, and it’s the first time Jun heard that ever since Jun’s insensitive comment on Aiba’s behalf. He looks at Aiba who smiles at him, and it’s then Jun knows that they both mean it, him and Nino. They’re not blaming Jun and they don’t hate Jun for it. He lightly punches Nino in the arm, and Nino makes an exaggerated rub at the spot Jun just hit with his fist.  
  
“So Sho-chan,” Aiba begins, going back to the topic as if he never shed a new side to himself and to Nino’s, “I met him when this crazy hovercar driver kicked me out because I apparently didn’t know where I was going,” and Jun smiles at the story, “he was wrong by the way, because I totally knew I wasn’t heading for the shipyard and yet he brought me there, telling me to do him a favor and send myself out to Andromeda or something.”  
  
Beside him, Nino laughs, and Jun joins him. Only Aiba will have the wildest tales of meeting someone. Jun shakes his head in amusement. “And?” he prompts, “What did you tell the driver?”  
  
Aiba finishes his shot with a wince, before saying, “Told him he can’t order me around so we ended up screaming at each other right outside the shipyard.” He shrugs his shoulders like it’s nothing, and from the corner of his eye, Jun sees Nino smothering his giggles with his left hand.  
  
“So you screamed at one another, then?” Jun asks, resting his cheek on his palm, and Aiba blinks as if he’s trying to recollect everything.  
  
“Well it started attracting people of course,” he tells Jun, waving a hand sheepishly. “We were loud, that driver really did hate me for bringing him out of the metropolis. So anyway, people came to see what the all the noise was about, and Sho-chan was there.”  
  
Jun guessed as much. He had a feeling it was either Sho or Ohno who found Aiba causing a commotion outside, and had it been Ohno, he definitely would put a stop to it being the foreman, and Sho, well. He’d stop it simply because he’s Sho.  
  
“Sho-chan dragged me away from the crazy driver and helped me find my way back,” Aiba finishes with a smile on his face. No wonder he calls Sho Sho-chan, Jun thinks. Aiba never forgets any form of help extended to him, and seeing as he treats humans and replicants equally, he undoubtedly formed a friendship with Sho, probably right from the very moment they met.  
  
Nino whistles from his side. “You’re forgetting the important parts again, Aiba-shi,” he says, fingers tapping against the table’s surface. Jun sneaks a glance at Nino, and Nino raises an eyebrow as a challenge.  
  
Aiba places both hands together in a gesture of apology. “Sorry, sorry,” he says, “Sho-chan found out my former occupation,” and Aiba tilts his head at this and Jun nods, “so I guess you already know what happened next.”  
  
Jun narrows his eyes. “He asked you the basics regarding his model as any replicant would,” he says carefully, and Aiba just nods. “And you can’t tell me Sho’s date of manufacture because?”  
  
Aiba sighs, and he looks forlorn again. Before Aiba can open his mouth however, Nino speaks for him, “Because it’s not his place to tell you,” and for a while Nino and Jun stare at one another, daring each other to say more, till Aiba clears his throat and pats Jun on the back.  
  
“It’s really something Sho-chan should tell you himself,” Aiba tells him. “Because we all know what it means to you guys. It’s not like the birthday we humans have because when we were born, we weren’t exactly like this already,” he gestures to himself, “we developed over time to get to whatever we are to wherever and whoever we are, unlike you and Nino, and unlike Sho-chan.”  
  
Jun nods in understanding. “Do you know who made him?” he asks Aiba for one last bit of possible information. “Or is he also like me? Maker unknown, only that my purpose is to be here, to serve here and make the most out of my four-year lifespan according to my model specs?”  
  
Aiba shakes his head and Jun drops it, already getting the answer he’ll ever need for tonight. He and Sho are apparently more similar than he thought originally. He whips out his pad, asking Sho to meet him as soon as he’s able despite knowing how busy and jam-packed both their schedules are. He labels the message as urgent and sends it before he can think otherwise.  
  
Both Nino and Aiba watch this without judgment in their eyes, and when Jun meets Nino’s eyes, Nino simply cocks his head. “If you need me to cover for you,” he begins slowly, and Jun rolls his eyes, resulting to Aiba laughing at the two of them.  
  
“Just saying you can always entrust your clients with me,” Nino says with a hand over his heart, a gesture of mock servitude. “And that you can trust they’ll be in very good hands.”  
  
Jun slaps him at the knee. “That’s never going to happen,” he tells Nino, and Nino purses his lips.  
  
“Worth a shot,” Nino tells Aiba, who just gives his finest work a thumbs up. Whatever reaction Jun might have for that gets cut off by his pad beeping, its signal for an incoming message. He flicks a finger at the screen to open it a little hurriedly. He frowns a bit when he sees Sho’s reply of, “2300, 11/14, 2857962 74E 56N.”  
  
Nino, who is hovering at Jun’s left, also frowns at the message. “Is he that uptight? Does he always send you coordinates instead of actual addresses?” and Jun hears Aiba laugh at the question.  
  
Jun nudges Nino with an elbow. “I labeled it urgent so he probably thought I was in someplace not private,” he explains. Nino hums noncommittally, apparently dropping the subject.  
  
Aiba points to Jun’s pad screen, leaving a distinct smudge on the screen, which earns a glare from Jun. Aiba mouths a ‘sorry’ before pointing out, “11/14. You said it’s urgent, but that’s in a week though,” and Jun notices that he’s right. A week. Any day before today he might have not considered it a long wait, but after finding out that Sho is possibly running out of time like he is, they may not really have the luxury of a week.  
  
Before he can send Sho a request to reconsider the date, Nino stops him with a particularly strong jab to his side. “If he’s as good as he says about his job,” he begins, and Jun answers immediately, “He is,” earning a smile from Nino, who then continues like he wasn’t interrupted at all, “then you can’t blame him if he gets a lot on his plate.”  
  
On his right, Aiba taps his shoulder. “Nino’s right, Matsujun, and I don’t just say this because I made him, but it’s not any different from you having more than you can account for due to the visitor influx.” Aiba looks sympathetic, and Jun can’t find it in him to be angry at either Aiba or Nino. They do have a point.  
  
Nino shrugs. “He probably set it in a week so you can keep your schedules free,” and Jun has a feeling Nino’s right about that, but he refuses to let Nino know. He refuses to feed Nino’s already inflating ego so he doesn’t say anything. “We all know how anal Sho-yan can be with schedules to the point he makes you look less wound up, and that’s a compliment, Matsumoto, considering your dismal chances at finding someone because you obviously have a stick up your ass.”  
  
That may be true because Sho’s very precise with how long their meetings last, never exceeding a minute or even a second. And yet Jun remembers the 27.6% tally of Sho’s tardiness and he can’t shake off the nagging feeling that he may already be too late to ask the question, already too late to be able to do something about it.  
  
It’s his overthinking, he realizes. It doesn’t help with anything because he just realized now that if Sho’s time is as short as his, how come Jun’s not feeling any of the telltale signs of his functionality dropping?  
  
That can only mean that two things, then. One is that Jun is overanalyzing that 27.6% and interpreting it as Sho forgetting things when he simply looks confused, as well as overanalyzing Sho’s decreased efficiency regarding his work when Jun is there. The second possibility is that Jun is not overanalyzing anything at all and Sho’s time is actually running out faster than his own.  
  
He desperately wishes it’ll be the former.  
  
Aiba nudges his shoulder and Jun suddenly remembers where he is and that he didn’t dignify Nino’s usual jabs at his ego with a response. Aiba only looks at him like he knows exactly what Jun is thinking, and Jun doesn’t even have to look at Nino to tell that Nino knows exactly what he’s thinking.  
  
Aiba places his hand on Jun’s shoulder and looks at him before asking, “How much time do you have left, Matsujun?” and there’s so much concern in his eyes and Jun knows that if he tells the truth, it will break Aiba’s heart because being a former bioengineer makes you too aware of the gravity of time running out. Aiba’s origins make him more sensitive to the topic, and Jun knows that they all know that there’s no way to get an extension, that the lifespan limit is absolute and cannot be circumvented by any means. Four years on the dot, nothing more.  
  
Jun closes his eyes. “Nine months, twenty-three days.” He doesn’t say the hours because he’s not talking to a replicant and he deems the hours negligible at this point of the night. When Jun opens his eyes, Aiba looks deep in thought, and Jun says, “Don’t worry about it,” despite not being certain of what Aiba’s thinking.  
  
From his left he hears Nino hum in agreement. “He’s right, Aiba-shi. There’s nothing you can do and we know that. We understand,” Nino looks at Jun for confirmation and Jun nods. “It’s not up to you anymore, be it J or Sho-chan, or heck, even me. You already did all you can.”  
  
Aiba exhales a breath, like he just gave up and it’s so uncharacteristic of him that Jun has to tear his eyes away. “You’re right, Nino,” Aiba agrees, and Nino just huffs. “I always am. You made me that way,” he says, brimming with confidence that makes both Jun and Aiba smile.  
  
Nino shifts his attention to Jun before telling him, “It’s a week. If you notice something awry, tell me or Aiba-shi here. I know what you’re thinking and you can’t deny it, and we all know I’ll just laugh at your face if you even attempt it so don’t waste your breath. Anyway, if Sho isn’t as tightly coiled as a fucking tritanium wiring, tell us.”  
  
Jun snorts. “He’s not as tightly coiled as a tritanium wire, you have it all wrong,” he corrects Nino with a shake of his head.  
  
Nino just spins on the bar stool and places his elbows on the tabletop. “Six point six weeks and you already know that much for yourself? I’m actually amazed. To think you haven’t banged him yet at that,” he says, eyebrows lifting. Jun scowls at him and Aiba just giggles unhelpfully.  
  
If Jun makes a personal record of how often Nino suggests something crude whenever Sho’s involved and gets a credit every time it happens, he thinks he can retire absolutely rich and far earlier than expected.  
  
Aiba stands up from Jun’s right and gives Jun’s shoulder a squeeze. “I’ll make sure I won’t be far away in case something comes up,” he tells Jun, and Jun nods gratefully. He doesn’t know whatever he did in his life to deserve the concern of someone like Aiba, but he treasures it even in his limited time.  
  
“Please don’t end up in the stargate penitentiary again,” Nino pleads, and Jun whips his head in surprise, eyes wide and questioning.  
  
Aiba points an accusatory finger at Nino’s direction. “That was one time, Ninomiya Kazunari, one time! And I already repaid you with the bail so you can forget about that!” Aiba’s pouting now, and Jun thinks it’s actually an endearing sight on him. He doesn’t stop himself from chuckling. The more Jun gets to know Aiba, the more certain he comes that Aiba can qualify for a space pirate in a few years’ time.  
  
That is, if he isn’t one yet.  
  
“Can’t,” Nino says, pointing to his temple. “You made me that way. You only have yourself to blame.” With that, Nino stands up from his seat as well, calling the bartender and forwarding credits. He shoots Jun a look when Jun raises an eyebrow at the sight of him paying, actually paying, and Nino just shrugs with a wave of his hand.  
  
“Keep in touch, Jun-kun,” Nino tells him before giving him his trademark salute. He grabs Aiba’s arm and leads him out of the obscure bar, and for the first time in three point twenty-five years, in his solitude, Jun feels how each second ticks by and wonders if they will stop if he asked them to, if he told them to wait.


	4. Night Market

The coordinates Sho sent him a week ago led him to a marketplace that offers a variety of delicacies available across different quadrants. Not exactly a private place to discuss anything urgent, but Jun sees the merit in the choice. The noise and activity around them will successfully divert any attention that they can probably acquire for themselves during their stay, and that gives the best illusion of privacy for their case.  
  
Jun stares at a particular shellfish labeled as something that originated from the Orion Nebula, and frowns at the price for it. He’s never been to Orion, though he knows how to speak it because he’s had clients who came from there, but is the inflation rate itself so drastic that the unknown organism in front of Jun is at eighty thousand credits?  
  
Praximus is far from being poor since its reputation as being contemporary ranks its standard of living almost at the top. Any colonies established near Regulus are still more prosperous however, since the mineral deposits they can mine there are deemed to be priceless on Earth. Praximus V has nothing to offer except for its state-of-the-art facilities devoted to luxurious life, which, in turn, makes the colony a popular tourist spot across the galaxies.  
  
The thing about off-world colonies is that despite being off-world, they still follow Earth’s currency exchange rates as a standard. And whichever colony gets to offer a more priceless artifact to Terra naturally controls a large percent of the inflation.  
  
Still, eighty thousand credits is too much for a shellfish. He doesn’t even know if it’s edible.  
  
He hears someone clear his throat behind him and he turns, meeting Sho’s eyes. He’s wearing the same cardigan Jun picked for him on their third meeting. “That’s an Orion Pecten, actually,” Sho says, gesturing to the shellfish Jun’s been glaring at for the past few minutes. “Not a Haustrum like the label claims it to be.”  
  
Jun turns his attention back to the shellfish, before looking at Sho again. “Are you saying this is a complete rip-off?” he asks, lips curling to a slight smile.  
  
Sho blinks at him before saying, “I’m just saying you don’t want to pay for something that isn’t even what it claims to be,” and Jun can find no flaw in that thinking, but it’s not like he’s planning to buy the thing. He was just thinking how atrocious the price is.  
  
“I wasn’t going to buy it,” he tells Sho, frowning a little when Sho simply purses his lips. “How did you know that much about shellfish, anyway? They teach you that in the shipyard too?”  
  
Sho cocks his head at the question, appearing very amused. “Satoshi-kun likes these things,” he says, gesturing to everything else behind Jun. “As well as any manner of marine life in any galaxy. It interests him so much,” Sho tells him, and the way he says it sounds so fond that Jun is almost jealous of Ohno.  
  
Because Satoshi-kun is obviously Ohno, and Jun often wonders how long they’ve known each other to the point that Sho calls the human by his given name. He also wonders if Sho’s relationship with Ohno extends to beyond being an engineer and his foreman, and at what extent exactly. He never asked Ohno about it because the man is either too tight-lipped or his mind is always drifting that you can’t say anything to him without him going, “Eh?”  
  
Jun gave up trying to have a conversation with Ohno long ago.  
  
Mostly, Ohno just leads him to wherever Sho is in the shipyard and the only words they exchange with one another is a greeting of, “It’s been a while, Matsumoto-san,” when he spots Jun at the main platform and a farewell of, “Until next time, Matsumoto-san.”  
  
Ohno and Sho aren’t very different in that aspect. Sho still hasn’t called him Jun, always Matsumoto-san or Matsumoto-kun, and honestly, Jun wonders if one of Praximus twin suns has to go on supernova in order for Sho to simply drop the formalities and just say it. Jun doesn’t understand what’s stopping Sho actually, seeing as Matsumoto is three syllables longer than, say, Jun, and it frustrates him.  
  
Add an honorific then it automatically becomes four times longer.  
  
Jun hums noncommittally, refusing to indulge Sho to talk about his foreman. That’s not what Jun called him here for, after all. If urgent means that they get to talk about shellfish and Ohno Satoshi, Jun wonders what kind of label he has to add to his next transmission that it will get Sho’s attention and focus on him alone.  
  
Sho narrows his eyes, and Jun smiles at his sharpness. They haven’t even known each other for that long and yet Sho can already tell that something’s up. Jun gestures with a tilt of his head, saying, “Let’s take a walk,” and lets Sho fall into step beside him, the noise around them filling Jun’s ears and muting his senses, masking his nervousness.  
  
He doesn’t know how to exactly breach the topic. “What’s your incept date?” never worked since day one so he abandoned that kind of approach long ago. Reminding Sho of how much time Jun has left won’t serve any purpose either, seeing as Sho has a computer inside him that can do the math just as easily as Jun’s own programming can. Aiba and Nino both told him that it’s something Sho should tell him himself, but how to make Sho say it, that’s the question Jun needs an answer to. Jun knows what he has to do, he just doesn’t know how to exactly do it, and Jun, being Jun, feels frustrated about that.  
  
Jun doesn’t notice that they’ve been walking in silence for quite a while, until he feels one of Sho’s fingers touch the back of his hand, successfully getting Jun’s attention. Sho never touched him on his own volition, it’s always Jun initiating and Jun never got past the deliberate brushes of fingers when they’re working together. He doesn’t count the yoga session for this because the yoga session definitely backfired on him and he’s still bitter about that.  
  
Jun looks at Sho who won’t meet his eyes, his finger still in contact with Jun’s skin. “I can hear you thinking,” Sho tells him, and Jun smiles a little at that. “Only that I can’t tell what you’re thinking of so I’ll make you a deal.”  
  
Jun straightens at that, eyes focused on Sho. Sho focuses on his face that isn’t his eyes, but Jun doesn’t call him out on it. Sho never looks at him in the eye unless he has to, unless he’s trying to catch Jun off-guard and he feels like gloating about it.  
  
Jun waits. He has to hear what Sho’s offer is.  
  
“You say it,” Sho tells him, stopping in his tracks, making Jun stop too. “Then in return I’ll say it. I can’t tell you anything unless you give me something to go by, after all.”  
  
Jun purses his lips in thought. This might be his only chance to ask, to know the truth. Sho’s offering to meet him in the middle, which is unusual for him because this is Sho, the same replicant who told Jun to show up in his workplace without any explanation and did the same when Jun asked, the same one who still won’t call him by his given name but gave him a jumpsuit with it, the same Sho who couldn’t say congratulations when Jun aced his practical exam and yet wore the troostite necklace the next time they met.  
  
The same Sho whose finger is still in contact with the back of his hand for three minutes and fifty-three seconds now.  
  
It’s so unusual and yet so very Sho that Jun finds himself acquiescing to the request without much thought. Around them the night market is filled with life, a myriad of scents in the air and the eight moons of Praximus over their heads, surrounded by still unnamed constellations. Jun takes a deep breath before squaring his shoulders and facing Sho.  
  
“I met Aiba-kun again after a while,” is what he ends up saying, and Sho raises both eyebrows in surprise. Jun just nods before he continues, “I think you already know what I tried to ask him.”  
  
He sees Sho swallow a lump in his throat, then he’s drawing his finger back and resumes walking in the same pace he and Jun were at earlier. Jun falls into step with him, the silence stretching and making Jun uncomfortable. He’s starting to think he may have ended up saying the wrong thing after all.  
  
They reach the end of the night market, the noise now behind them but still audible, and Jun tries to calm his nerves by not looking at Sho so he focuses on the flurry of activity he can still hear. When Jun looks up, he sees Praximus’ biggest satellite, seeming to loom over their heads.  
  
Finally, Sho sighs. “You asked him the same thing you asked me after I told you my name,” Sho says, his voice suddenly as hard as steel.  
  
It’s a sensitive topic, then. But it’s now or never and Jun chooses now, so he pushes. “And you know what he told me?” he asks Sho, hoping his own voice doesn’t betray how terrified he is that this conversation can be one of their very last, should Sho choose to end their arrangement by citing breach of privacy or something similar. Sho can actually do that and Jun knows he will respect Sho’s decision no matter what, even if he won't be happy with it.  
  
Sho looks at him, waiting. Jun just sighs, running a hand through his hair, feeling the metal of one of his rings against his scalp, its coolness a stark contrast to the artificial heat his body is producing. “He told me that he can’t tell me that, that it’s not his place,” he finishes, handing Sho the reins. He wonders now if Sho will honor his side of the bargain. Jun can’t tell anything by looking at Sho, Sho has closed himself off and he looks so similar to the replicant that showed up in that bar that night they first met, like Jun never really managed to get past any of his defenses.  
  
For all Jun knows that bit might be true and he was just putting meaning into things.  
  
A part of him hurts to look at Sho, but Jun wills himself not to tear his gaze away. For a moment Sho just looks contemplative, blinking slowly as if trying to determine what his next step should be now that it’s his move and Jun’s laid the best trap he’s capable of.  
  
“And he’s right,” Sho says after a while, making Jun close his eyes in defeat. “My incept date is my own, no matter how long I’ve known Aiba-chan doesn’t change a thing about the nature of that,” he pauses, sneaking a glance at Jun before continuing with, “Not even you can change the nature of that,” in a small voice, almost a whisper.  
  
Jun clenches his fists in an attempt to rein in his temper. Getting angry won’t solve anything. So what if Sho just said to his face that it’s not his business, that he should, in the simplest terms, just fuck off and leave it alone? It’s not like Jun hasn’t been rejected before. It rarely happens, there’s a reason he’s as popular as Nino after all, but it does happen, and it did happen way before Sho ever thought of doing it.  
  
So really, he’s not the first to do it. It’s not a big deal. Or so he tells himself, as he takes deep breaths in an attempt to steady himself, to calm his raging heart. He’s still not looking at Sho, the mere sight of him makes Jun want to smash something, probably that eighty thousand shellfish just for the fun of seeing its natural protection shatter and the creature inside writhing on the ground as it struggles for its life.  
  
He starts to walk away from Sho. Jun finds that it’s suddenly difficult to stay in the same space as him and Jun needs time to recollect himself, needs air to breathe normally again. Whoever programmed him did an exact carbon copy of anger, and Jun is slightly fascinated at how it manifested in him. It differs for every replicant, the manifestation of emotions, as much as it differs between two humans.  
  
He thinks he may have made it to three steps before he feels a hand around his arm, the contact scalding enough that Jun almost wrenches his arm away. But he’s seeing red and the moment he meets Sho’s eyes, he knows Sho can see just how angry and frustrated he feels. After all, he made sure Sho can see just how much should he choose to meet Jun’s eyes.  
  
“Wait,” Sho says, voice suddenly losing its hardness and sounding a bit pleading. "Please wait." In the height of Jun’s anger, he failed to notice how Sho looks defeated, resigned, how his entire self seems to deflate, his face unreadable and lips trembling. Jun has never seen him like this.  
  
He stops, letting Sho turn him around. Sho exhales a breath before looking at him with eyes laced with defeat. “I said my incept date doesn’t change its nature despite my association with anyone,” he begins, and Jun suppresses the desire to hit him for repeating such a selfish thing. Bastard, Jun thinks, his eyes narrowing in fury.  
  
“Because not even my association with a former bioengineer, a human, or even with another replicant can help me about that,” Sho tells him, his voice soft, and Jun feels the anger disappear in waves, confusion taking its place. Help? Did Sho just say help? He looks at Sho with a slight frown, a silent plea for him to explain further.  
  
Sho closes his eyes before sighing. He bites his lip before looking at Jun again, still not letting go of Jun, giving Jun no choice but to hear him out.  
  
Sho flashes him a sad smile, and it’s the first smile he gives Jun ever since they’ve known each other, and Jun’s mouth parts open in surprise. He doesn’t have to wait long though, because Sho’s suddenly tightening his grip on Jun’s elbow, and he's suddenly stepping forward so that he’s in Jun’s space, his eyes pleading.  
  
“Because,” he whispers, and Jun holds his breath for whatever he’s going to say next, “I don’t know when my incept date is,” and Jun thinks Praximus could have stopped in its orbit and could have encountered a sudden seismic activity and he still won’t feel a thing. He thinks something must have happened because he suddenly can’t hear any of the sounds around him, he can’t hear the night market at all because they’re all dulled by the sound of his heart wanting to escape from his chest.  
  
“I don’t know when I’ll die, Jun,” Sho tells him, using his name for the very first time, saying it as if Jun didn’t understand exactly what he meant earlier, and for a while Jun just meets Sho’s eyes, uncertain of what to say.  
  
He thinks he can’t say anything because Sho finally tells him the truth and it’s worse, so much worse than what Jun expected, because even before he came to meet Sho in this place he already formulated a couple of possible answers. The worse one he can come up with is learning that Sho is closer to his end than Jun is with his own, and still it’s no match for the truth Sho presents to him. Jun’s heart breaks for him, for Sho, for the replicant Jun’s inevitably found himself attached with despite Sho’s initial reservations towards him.  
  
It’s cruel, it’s nothing but cruelty because whoever made Sho ensured that his creation has no idea when was its activation despite knowing how vital that information is for replicants. That’s possible, Jun has heard of bioengineers erasing the data and memory banks of their androids regarding their origins and any information regarding their existence from any of the databases available.  
  
Which means that Sho is either an experimental android or an illegally manufactured one. Jun doesn’t know which one, and he’s positive Sho has no idea either. Jun is 98.6% certain that they will never know for sure because Sho’s been here for more than three years like him and Sho, at this point, has probably accepted that he will never have answers regarding who he truly is and who made him.  
  
Jun wonders how long has Sho searched for his own self, for his own identity before he made peace with whatever he has and settled himself to be contented with shipyard work, probably hoping that at least, in that way, he’s still able to make a difference. He wonders how long Sho spent his days thinking it’s his last because he has no idea when it will come. Jun’s heart aches for him at the thought because that only means that Sho has been alone for so, so long. It explains Sho’s reservations towards him from the very beginning.  
  
Sho seems to suddenly realize how close they are, that he touched Jun on his own volition and that he just said Jun’s name, and he tries to take a step back, his grip on Jun finally slacking. But Jun is quicker, he’s always been the quicker one between the two of them, so he grabs both of Sho’s shoulders and does the one thing he’s always been wanting to do, ever since Sho dirtied his clothes when he made Jun fix three shuttlecrafts, ever since Sho handed him a tritanium coil and proposed that they learn from one another.  
  
He kisses Sho with all the combined pent-up energy and frustration inside him, kisses him until Sho gasps in surprise, his lips parting just enough for Jun to be able to taste him, to finally know for himself how Sho tastes like. He feels Sho’s surprise for only a moment, then he’s returning Jun’s kiss with fervor, his hands finding their place on either side of Jun’s neck.  
  
Jun lets go of Sho’s shoulders to settle on Sho’s hips, and the next breath he takes is done in Sho’s mouth, the next thing he thinks of voicing out lost against Sho’s lips. The computer part of Jun, the part that still grounds him with reality, calculates the probability of Sho actually liking him as much he likes Sho and puts the number at 92.4%, making Jun smile against Sho’s lips.  
  
Sho’s thumbs are now stroking the sides of Jun’s face, mapping out his jaw at first. Sho’s fingers are tracing unknown but burning patterns on Jun’s skin, beginning from his jaw before reaching his earlobe, making Jun squirm at the touch. Jun moves his mouth away from Sho’s, letting out a small laugh near Sho’s cheek.  
  
“That seriously tickles,” he whispers with a little laugh against Sho’s ear, and when he meets Sho’s eyes, he sees Sho’s pupils blown and it sends a shiver down Jun’s spine. Jun licks his lips and watches how Sho’s eyes follow the movement, before leaning in to kiss him again, and Jun obliges him. He’s always wanted to do this. Granted, Jun has been doing a lot of this ever since he got sent to Praximus, but it’s the first time in his ultra-short life that he’s actually doing it because he wants to, not because it’s part of what he’s programmed to do and clients are paying him to do it.  
  
Jun finds that while he can’t stop kissing Sho, he still has to breathe every once in a while, so when they finally part for air and time seems to resume its normal pace, he settles for letting his fingers know how Sho’s skin feels like by dragging them over the sides of Sho’s face, his brows, the lines surrounding his eyes.  
  
It’s like Jun is seeing him for the very first time and he has so much he wants to know, so many things he wants to find out for himself. Sho, for his part, most likely feels the same, because his fingers are tracing over Jun’s lips (and Jun takes the opportunity to plant a chaste kiss every time they make contact), his thumb rubbing circles on Jun’s cheekbone. Jun leans to the touch, the contact sending sparks on his skin.  
  
Jun takes the initiative, leaning forward to whisper in Sho’s ear. “Do you mind if we take this someplace else?” he asks, his voice probably huskier than he intended, and Jun’s certain it’s the human part of him taking over. This time, it’s the human in Jun that makes him crave and makes him cave in in return, his programming utterly useless in this. He nips at Sho’s earlobe when Sho doesn’t respond quickly enough for his standards, and he grins when he hears Sho’s sharp intake of breath.  
  
Jun lets his lips travel lower, nipping Sho’s jawline lightly, and saying against Sho’s skin, “Might not have a next time,” and suddenly Sho’s tilting his face back up by a firm grip on his chin, his eyes boring into Jun’s.  
  
“Yes,” is all he says, and this close, Jun can see the desperation in his eyes, just how much Sho held himself back all this time (for Jun’s sake or his, Jun doesn’t know, but he can find that out later), and that’s all Jun needs to take Sho’s hand and lead him to the other side of the marketplace. He feels Sho’s fingers shift from his grasp to entwine their fingers together, and Jun notes that from 92.4% his calculation is now at 94.8%.  
  
Sho surprises him when he gives coordinates Jun never received before to the hovercar driver, speaking before Jun can even think of opening his mouth. When he looks at Sho questioningly, Sho simply raises an eyebrow in challenge, and Jun shuts the window separating the passengers’ side from the driver’s before grabbing hold of Sho’s cardigan to kiss him.  
  
Sho meets him with equal enthusiasm, his hand at the back of Jun’s neck and pulling him closer, closer to Sho like there’s still space between them, his tongue exploring every corner of Jun’s mouth. Jun wonders where Sho learned to kiss like this, because for his part, he can definitely say it’s all part of the program, that he’s been made to kiss like this. That kind of reasoning isn’t available to Sho.  
  
Jun’s hand travels to Sho’s collarbones, and he pulls away from Sho’s lips when his hand touches the chain of the troostite necklace, hidden underneath Sho’s shirt.  
  
Jun pulls it out, the mineral glinting in the lights they pass by as the hovercar continuously moves. “Bastard,” Jun says accusingly, and Sho just plants a chaste kiss on his lips like an apology. Jun doesn’t let it distract him though.  
  
“How long have you been wearing this?” he asks, raising the pendant in between them, because Jun needs to know and he needs space in between them in order to know, no matter how excruciating every second of having that space is.  
  
Sho tilts his head, a grin on his face. “The entire time,” he tells Jun, “I actually like this necklace,” and Jun wants to remove the smugness from his face.  
  
“You’ve been holding out on me,” he accuses Sho, and Sho simply grins wider before pulling the necklace out of Jun’s grasp. Jun follows the movement before meeting Sho’s eyes again. “You’ve been holding back, huh?” he asks, feeling smug now.  
  
Sho leans forward in Jun’s space like he’s telling Jun a secret, his eyes fixed on Jun’s lips. “You have no idea. I’ve been holding back for as long as you can imagine,” he says, leaning to whisper in Jun’s ear, and Jun lets out a nervous laugh at the admission.  
  
Jun moistens his lips, knowing that this close, Sho can hear the movement despite not being able to see it. He makes sure his lips are in contact with Sho’s ear when he says, “Not so immune to the pleasure model after all, are you, Sakurai Sho?” and he smiles gleefully when he sees how Sho shivers at the contact, the skin over Sho’s neck turning to gooseflesh.  
  
Jun waited for a long time to do this. Even before the fucking yoga that Sho can’t do at all but left Jun sticky and unsatisfied the morning after, something not even a morning jerk off at the sonic shower can fix, even before Sho let him see how much he actually appreciates Jun’s gift. He hears Sho’s deep breaths but he still refuses to cut Sho some slack, because Jun is certain that Sho held back as much as he did and it’s only fair that he makes the most out of the moment now.  
  
“You mean you,” Sho says softly, seeming to struggle for the words and for his next breath. Jun pulls back a little, frowning a bit in confusion, and it gives Sho the space he needs to continue. “You mean not immune to you, after all,” he says, making Jun smile.  
  
“Well,” Jun begins, finally leaning back against the hovercar’s cushions, making sure to put his hand on Sho’s knee. “You’re not really the first, so I can’t say I’m surprised,” he says before flashing Sho one of the haughty smirks he’s seen Nino use on him and on his clients.  
  
Sho puts his hand on top of Jun’s, and Jun flips his hand to hold Sho’s properly, and they remain like that, at least until the hovercar comes to a full stop and the driver indicates that they have arrived. Sho swipes a credit chip on the console beside the window Jun shut close earlier, and he doesn’t let go of Jun’s hand even after the hovercar’s speeding away and they’re standing in front of what seems to be Sho’s place.  
  
Jun looks at the building before them, and it’s not like the fancy apartment he lives in that Nino has a keycard duplicate to, nothing like the usual apartments for lease in the metropolis, but it looks welcoming, and that’s what makes it different from his place. It’s not just a place, or at least, doesn’t look like just one. Sho leads him inside, and they take an elevator to the 21st floor.  
  
Sho stops by a door with a plate of 2125, swiping a keycard and turning the knob without even waiting for the computer’s acknowledgement. Jun smiles at the sight, knowing full well that it’s his doing that makes Sho this impatient, this edgy. He wonders now how many times did Sho impatiently open this door because of him, because Sho has been holding back since probably forever like he told Jun. He finds that he likes being the cause of that, and makes sure that he’ll be the cause of it in the future.  
  
Jun steps inside, and he notes that it’s not as contemporary nor as fancy as his place, no, but still, it’s far from cheap, definitely. Either shipyard work is that rewarding or Sho’s simply that good at being an engineer that he gets paid well enough for his skills.  
  
Jun decides to voice that thought out loud. “How did you get a place like this?” because the area is spacious, in the corner there’s a small heap of spare parts that Jun raises an eyebrow at (such a workaholic, he thinks, to the point that Sho brings them home sometimes, but he’s not surprised), and most of those parts aren’t exactly space-conserving, and yet despite that taking up space, there’s still more than enough room for Sho to move around.  
  
Sho makes no indication of hearing him; he just shuts the door behind Jun, enabling secure locks via authorization, and Jun wonders if there’s a Ninomiya Kazunari in here too, another nosy bastard in Sho’s life who will simply barge in just because he feels like gracing people with his mostly unwanted presence. He smiles at the thought, despite the idea being horrifying if it were true. One Nino is enough for the entire universe, thank you very much.  
  
“Was that necessary?” Jun asks, indicating the double security. Sho turns around and Jun licks his lips unconsciously at the sight of Sho’s eyes, at the endless pools of black he can see. Sho pulls their bodies flush together by tugging at Jun’s belt loops, before stopping any of the protests Jun thought of saying with a kiss. Jun kisses back with the same intensity as the first time he kissed Sho, and soon enough, he licks at Sho’s lips, seeking entrance. When Sho’s mouth parts for him, Jun deepens the kiss by placing both of his hands on either side of Sho’s head, and he swallows any moan Sho thought of making.  
  
Sho removes the fingers he has hooked around Jun’s belt loops, and they slip under Jun’s shirt to touch the skin there, making Jun gasp in Sho’s mouth. Jun thinks Sho’s being underhanded, so he retaliates by nipping lightly at Sho’s lower lip, not enough to pierce the skin but more than enough to worry it and make it tender. When Jun pulls back, Sho’s lips look very much abused, and Jun counts that as a point in his court.  
  
Sho fingers travel from the edge of Jun’s abdomen up to his chest, before stopping and giving both of Jun’s nipples a light pinch. It sends a shiver all over Jun’s body, something he can’t suppress even if he puts his mind to it, and he feels Sho’s laughter against his neck, before feeling the hot swipe of his tongue at the point where Jun’s jaw meets his neck.  
  
One of Jun’s hands is pushing Sho’s mouth closer to his skin, closer to where Sho is tasting him, marking him most likely because Jun can feel Sho’s teeth against his neck, and his other hand is busy trying to find the button of Sho’s jeans. When he successfully finds the elusive bastard, he deftly pops it open and Sho retaliates by biting on Jun’s neck, not hard enough for it to hurt but hard enough to make Jun notice the change. Sho pinches Jun’s nipples for one last time, making Jun gasp before pulling back and grabbing the hem of Jun’s shirt, a silent request for Jun to get it off.  
  
Jun pulls back the hand that’s almost inside Sho’s jeans to raise his arms, and Sho pulls the shirt over Jun’s head, revealing smooth skin. Sho tosses the shirt to the side, probably to the same corner where he puts shuttle spare parts, Jun honestly doesn’t care anymore regardless how much the shirt cost him because he hears Sho’s sharp intake of breath when he looks at Jun, and that’s all the warning he gets before Sho’s pressing kisses to his clavicle, his tongue darting out to taste Jun’s skin every now and then. Sho’s hands are on Jun’s hips now, his fingers dancing at the waistband of Jun’s pants.  
  
It’s becoming increasingly difficult to breathe and Jun tries to regain any semblance of control by taking deep breaths because the last time he checked he’s the pleasure model, he’s supposed to be the one guiding Sho and telling him to take it slowly or to do it just like this, not the other way around. Besides, Sho’s still clothed, and Jun wrenches Sho’s mouth away from his throat to shoot him a glare.  
  
Sho, apparently, still has enough coherency in him to raise an eyebrow at Jun, much to Jun’s annoyance. He actually feels offended by that because that’s an insult to his very nature, the fact that the person (or in this case, replicant) he’s planning to spend the night with still has enough sense in them to challenge him back.  
  
Then again, that’s what makes Sho Sho, and what makes him not like the clients Jun’s been with for more than three years. Jun seems to forget that Sho’s a replicant like him because they both act like humans right now, but it’s the little things that remind him of it: the way Sho seems to know which parts of Jun to touch first to reduce him to breathless gasps, the way Sho knows how to touch Jun exactly, in a way that makes Jun so responsive to his attentions.  
  
Jun’s really wondering now if Sho’s really not a pleasure type like him.  
  
“Bed,” is all he says to Sho, who smiles at him, and Jun shoots him another glare before ordering him, “and take those clothes off,” giving Sho’s clothes a pointed look, hoping that that’s all it takes to make them disappear.  
  
Sho kisses his cheek sweetly, the passion from earlier deceptively gone, and it successfully gets rid of the annoyance Jun felt earlier. He hates how Sho seems to know what to do to make him change his mind because before this whole thing started, Jun prided himself with the reputation that he’s a hard man to please, a hard man to convince. Then Sho comes and all it takes is seven point six weeks of dancing around each other before Sho can finally claim that Jun is not as tough as he makes people believe.  
  
Get your groove back on, Matsumoto, he tells himself.  
  
Jun’s not even aware that he’s pouting, until Sho continuously plants short kisses to the sides of his mouth, deftly avoiding his lips. “Stop pouting,” Sho says against the corner of his lips, and Jun can feel him smile afterwards.  
  
He really hates Sho right now.  
  
He grabs at the buttons of Sho’s cardigan, the same blue cardigan Jun picked for him that night on Starlight Kiss, and undoes the buttons himself, Sho still laughing softly at the side of his face while his breath touches Jun’s cheek lightly. He hears Sho click his tongue when Jun gives a particularly hard tug at one button that refused to come undone.  
  
“What happened to the bed?” Sho asks him, amusement evident in his voice.  
  
Jun just makes a pointed _tch_ before saying, “We could get to that quicker if you’re actually helping me out with this,” pushing the blame on Sho, who just laughs softly against cheek before planting series of kisses down to Jun’s neck. The offending button finally comes undone, and Jun’s pushing the goddamn cardigan off Sho’s shoulders, revealing Sho’s toned arms underneath.  
  
Sho actually wore a sleeveless tee, and he has the gall to smirk at Jun when Jun stares at the sight in surprise. “What,” Sho says, but it’s not a question, and Jun just answers by tugging at the hem of Sho’s shirt to pull it over his head because as much as he likes seeing Sho’s arms, he also wants to see more, and that shirt, no matter how gratuitous, is still in the way.  
  
Sho helps him remove the shirt by raising his arms and Jun drinks in the sight of exposed skin, the flat planes of Sho’s chest and abdomen exposed to him and him alone. Despite the dim lighting they have, the necklace he bought for Sho glints invitingly as it lies right above Sho's sternum. Jun tosses the shirt behind him, one of his hands already moving to touch Sho’s abdominal muscles, the other on Sho’s back to push him flush against Jun’s equally naked torso.  The chain of the necklace is cold against Jun's heated skin but Sho’s hands wrap around his shoulder blades, keeping him in place.  
  
He kisses Sho’s neck, making sure to lightly nip at the Sho’s Adam’s apple and when Sho swallows with effort, Jun feels it bob against his lips. At this rate, they’ll probably never make it Sho’s bed. Jun doesn’t want to stop, doesn’t think he can and that not even fire raining on the colony can make him stop, not now when he finally gets to do what he always wanted to do and he finds out that it’s even better than he thought it would be.  
  
And yet, Jun wants to get the both of them to Sho’s bed because he knows how many times he has imagined himself and Sho there (78.4% of the time, his computer part says, ever helpful) and how many times it helped him come undone, so he stops his ministrations on Sho’s skin. He looks at Sho smugly when Sho makes a small noise of protest, and he pinches the spot just below Sho’s ribs before saying, “Bed, now.”  
  
Sho growls before he’s finally leading Jun to his bedroom, which is apparently not very far from the door because as soon as they reach it, Sho pushes him with enough force that makes Jun sit on the bed once the back of his knees hit the sides of it. Before Sho can descend on him however, Jun stops him with a hand on his chest and when Sho looks at him quizzically, Jun simply shoots a pointed look at Sho’s jeans.  
  
Sho responds by tilting his head at Jun’s pants, and Jun answers that by grabbing hold of Sho’s hips to reverse their positions, the leverage more than enough for him to stand up and shove Sho on the bed instead. With surprise on his side, he successfully manages to flip them, and any protest Sho plans to make Jun easily stops with a deep kiss, which is very much unlike the fleeting, teasing ones Sho kept on doing to him earlier.  
  
Sho’s hands move over the top of Jun’s pants, his fingers quickly undoing the button and soon, he’s yanking at the material hard enough that Jun breaks the kiss to slap his hands away. “You’re going to ruin them,” he admonishes Sho, who doesn’t even look the slightest bit sorry about it.  
  
If anything, he just looks at Jun as if to say, you remove them, then.  
  
Jun gets the pants off himself and watches as Sho takes in the extent of his interest, Sho's eyes on his cock straining from the confines of the black boxers he opted to wear tonight. Before Jun can make a clever retort, Sho pulls him close by wrapping one hand on the back of his thigh and placing the other on top of Jun’s ass cheeks, then Sho plants an open mouthed kiss on his still-clothed crotch, making Jun moan at the sight and at the feeling.  
  
Sho continuously teases him by leaving series after series of open mouthed kisses on Jun’s still-clothed cock, making no effort to remove the material separating his lips from Jun’s heated skin. Jun groans at the feeling of Sho’s lips, the heat and friction building inside his thighs before pooling in his groin, and yet it’s still not enough because all Sho does is to plant kiss after kiss, never letting Jun feel more.  
  
Time to do something about that then, Jun thinks, and he pulls at Sho’s hair to make Sho look at him, and Jun wants to hit him because he actually manages to look innocent, as if he’s not edging Jun without mercy only a while ago. Jun removes Sho’s hand from the back of his thigh, pulling at Sho’s hair hard enough to expose his neck, before he’s saying, “Get to the middle of the bed, Sakurai,” punctuating the order with a shove at Sho’s shoulder, making Sho grin.  
  
“Bossy,” he tells Jun, but he actually moves himself to the center of the bed, his back against the headboard, and he’s where Jun has always wanted him so Jun lets the comment slide for now.  
  
Jun finally notices that Sho doesn’t seem to make his bed before he leaves because his sheets are carelessly tossed to the side, his pillows still dented by last night’s sleep. Jun raises an eyebrow at the sight, and Sho shoots him a look from his position on the bed.  
  
“Seriously?” Sho asks, “You’re going to judge me for that now?” and Jun smirks before shooting a pointed glance at the pile of laundry at the foot of Sho’s bed. Sho groans. “Come here,” he tells Jun, frustration evident in his voice, and Jun gives him a sweet, deceptive smile.  
  
Who’s bossy now, he thinks, but he obliges.  
  
He climbs the bed and crawls to wherever Sho is, placing his knees on Sho’s sides and lowering himself so he’s astride Sho the next time they kiss, their cocks almost touching despite being separated by layers of fabric. Sho’s hands grab at Jun’s hips before sliding down to Jun’s buttocks, squeezing, and Jun moans in Sho’s mouth, his hands gripping for purchase at Sho’s angular shoulders. Sho drags his wet mouth across Jun’s cheek before sucking and nipping at the spot where Jun’s jaw meets his neck, hard enough that they’re both certain it’ll leave a mark come morning.  
  
Jun tries to pull back but Sho’s grip on him is hard and unyielding, making their clothed crotches brush against each other, the friction too much yet still not enough, and Jun bites his lower lip to prevent any noise from coming out.  
  
Sho is now panting at his neck, his breaths rushed yet heavy and hot, and Jun gives one of his shoulders a squeeze to get his attention. “Jeans,” is all Jun says, and he sees a dash of mischief in Sho’s eyes before Sho blinks it away, and he’s still not moving fast enough for Jun so Jun pushes him back to the headboard with both hands, hard enough to hear the wood come into contact against the wall.  
  
The impact makes Sho momentarily let go of him, and it’s all he needs to adjust his knees to their position at Sho’s either side before he’s planting kisses beginning from Sho’s collarbones down to his navel, which Jun pays extra attention to by nipping at the skin when he sees a distinct mark left by a former piercing there.  
  
Well, he certainly didn’t expect that.  
  
Jun pulls the zipper of Sho’s jeans down using his mouth, having already undone the button from earlier, and meets Sho’s eyes as he traps the small piece of metal between his teeth and drags it down, sees the way Sho’s focus is on him alone, the way Sho seems to restrain himself from telling Jun to hurry the fuck up and stop being such a tease.  
  
Jun places his hands on the sides of Sho’s pants, and Sho, thankfully, decides to help him get them off by lifting his hips off the bed, and soon enough Jun’s yanking the material off Sho’s legs with such force that makes Sho slide from his original position on the bed. He situates himself back to where he was earlier, his eyes never leaving Jun’s, and Jun fixes him with a look that clearly says, stay right where you are.  
  
When Jun shifts his attention to Sho’s erection, he thinks he’s not as mean as Sho when he leans forward and grabs Sho’s boxers to remove and toss them at the foot of the bed. Sho seems surprised by this, eyes narrowing, but he helpfully lifts his hips for Jun to be able to remove the offending material. Jun rewards Sho's cooperation by kissing the head of his cock and Sho responds with a moan cut short when he bites his lip.  
  
Jun takes that as a challenge, licking his lips before proceeding to plant open mouthed kisses on Sho’s shaft, his hand cupping Sho’s sack and massaging them a little. This is where Jun puts his program to the test, trying to find out what makes Sho groan using his lips, his teeth, the occasional swipes of his tongue against heated skin. This is where Jun lets Sho know that he’s been made for this, where he shows that he’s a pleasure model through and through.  
  
Sho keeps his hands at his side, clutching at the sheets desperately as if they can anchor him to reality and keep him from floating, keep him from thrusting into Jun’s hot mouth. Jun mouths at the vein on the side of Sho’s cock before flicking his tongue at the junction where the head meets the shaft, and one of Sho’s hands moves to cover his eyes, his pleased groans and breathless gasps the only assurances Jun needs to know that he’s doing it just right.  
  
Jun takes pity on Sho and gives the head a pressured suck by hollowing his cheeks. Sho’s hips surge forward at that, and one of Jun’s hands lands on Sho’s hip, gripping tight as if to say, stay there and don’t move, meanwhile all too aware that the metal band in one of his fingers is digging against the skin. Jun proceeds to take Sho deeper, his hand continuously massaging Sho while the other rubs circles on Sho’s hip with his thumb.  
  
Sho’s reduced to moans and breathless whispers of Jun’s name, and Jun revels in the moment. Not Matsumoto-san, not Matsumoto-kun, but Jun, just Jun, followed by a groan or an appreciative moan and Jun thinks that the entire wait is all worth it if the next time he gets to hear his name falling from Sho’s lips is also the next time Sho moans in appreciation as a result of his efforts.  
  
Sho stops him with a hand on his hair, slightly pulling at the strands. Jun lets go of Sho with an obscenely loud and wet pop, before licking his lips and tilting his head in question. “Can’t,” is all Sho says, and Jun doesn’t suppress the grin he feels like making. Sho pulls him by the arm and soon enough they’re kissing, Sho’s tongue chasing away remnants of his own taste from Jun’s mouth and Jun just lets him. Sho’s cock lies neglected between them as well as Jun’s, the latter still straining from the confines of the boxers he’s still wearing.  
  
He breaks off the kiss to remove the last article of clothing left on his own body, and Sho aids him by reaching out and helping to pull it off. Jun tosses it to the side, not minding where it lands, and he gasps in surprise when Sho takes hold of his cock, Sho’s thumb rubbing at the slit. Sho leans forward, Jun still astride him, and his hand continuously pumps Jun’s shaft while his teeth finds one of Jun’s nipples before giving it a little tug. Jun moans Sho’s name before he can help it, and he feels Sho’s smile against his chest, Sho’s hand still squeezing and pumping his cock.  
  
It eventually becomes too much that Jun wants to speed things up, his nails leaving indentations on Sho’s shoulders. Sho seems to understand because he lets go of Jun momentarily to fumble with the many things on top of his bedside table (Jun sees a small screwdriver and he raises an eyebrow at that), before finally grabbing a small tube. Jun actually didn’t think Sho will have one so close by, and he finds himself asking, “You still have time for that despite the economic boost? I thought you said it was really busy for the shipyards,” before he can help himself.  
  
Sho rolls his eyes at the question before uncapping the tube with skilled fingers, the same fingers that typed lines after lines of code and subroutines while asking Jun if he can monitor impulse power level. It’s like a memory of long ago, now that they’re here and Jun is astride Sho. Jun gets cut off from this line of thought when Sho suddenly presses a finger inside him, making his mouth part at the sensation of it, the slow burn of it.  
  
Jun’s nails are digging on Sho’s shoulders, and he arches into Sho’s second finger, while Sho’s kissing his way down Jun’s body, leaving a trail scorching enough for his skin to remember. Sho stretches him slowly, taking his time, till he’s inserting a third making Jun’s thighs tremble, his lips quivering at the feeling and his eyes shut tight.  
  
“Enough,” Jun says after a moment, eyes snapping open. “That’s enough.”  
  
Sho slides his fingers out, then he’s slicking himself up and down, coating himself with lube, and yet he’s still moving too slowly for Jun that Jun clicks his tongue in annoyance. He grabs Sho’s cock and guides it inside himself, Sho’s hands on his thighs, Sho watching him like he's going to break himself, like he’s never done this before (not with Sho, but come on now), but Jun can’t think straight, not with Sho finally pressing into him so he just slides down until he’s got Sho’s balls snug against his ass, making the both of them moan.  
  
Sho makes a whimper of his name, his hands clinging tightly to Jun's hips and Jun truly feels like gloating at the moment because right now, this is him showing how a pleasure type does what he's made for, except that he can't because he feels so full and Sho's just perfect inside him.  
  
“Come on, come on,” Jun murmurs, grinding himself against Sho hoping Sho will just take the fucking hint and _move_ along with him, to actually thrust into Jun to hit that sweet spot inside that will make Jun blank out and get swamped by blinding heat.  
  
“Sho,” he groans, which apparently does it because Sho’s suddenly thrusting up and Jun just takes it because it’s his, it’s finally his to take. This is his. Sho spread under him, spread out and slick and perfect, and it’s better, way better than what he thought and imagined it would be.  
  
He whispers a number of filthy things, telling Sho how good it feels, telling him how good he makes Jun feel right now and how much he doesn't want Sho to stop, and Sho answers back by burying his head at the crook where Jun’s neck meets his shoulder, leaving another mark there, and the sting makes Jun bite back a hiss.  
  
Jun is close, so close that he can feel his toes curling and thighs clenching, and he pushes Sho back against the headboard before bending forward and rolling his hips in sweet, little moves that make Sho repeatedly rub against his prostate. Sho’s hands are firm on his hips, then they move to his ass, squeezing and urging him on. His name spills freely from Sho's full and trembling lips when he does a particular languid roll of his hips and he basks in the moment.  
  
God, he doesn’t want to ever stop hearing Sho say his name like that.  
  
“Sho,” he groans, and he’s pretty sure he’s begging for something, asking Sho for something but he doesn’t even know what exactly, only that Sho can give it to him whatever it is—  
  
And Sho seems to understand perfectly because he puts one hand on Jun’s cock and just says, “Jun,” sounding breathless, like it’s torn from him and it’s such a difficult thing to say, and that’s all it takes. Jun’s falling over the edge, head thrown back and clenching down, nails digging to Sho’s shoulders for support. Somewhere along the way he knows he takes Sho with him, that Sho follows him not long after because Sho stills for a moment and presses bruises on his hips, then he’s shuddering, coming with a long, drawn out moan of Jun’s name, and Jun knows he can watch Sho like this, just like this till his time’s up.  
  
Jun leans forward after a while, sliding off and ignoring the sudden ache of feeling empty. He kisses Sho and tells him to stay before going to Sho’s bathroom and grabbing a towel and running it under hot water. Jun looks at his reflection at the mirror by the sink, and he finally sees how disheveled his hair is, how abused his lips look, and how Sho reddened his skin with kisses and marked him in places that will be difficult to hide.  
  
That bastard, he thinks, but he knows that there are a lot of ways to get even now that they’ve reached another development.  
  
He steps out of the bathroom and cleans them both off before collapsing beside Sho who doesn’t say anything for a while. Jun starts to fear Sho may have been regretting it, that is until Sho presses him down the mattress and gives him a hard, bruising kiss, and that’s when Jun knows that this isn’t just a one-time thing with him.  
  
He nuzzles Sho’s jaw afterwards, knowing that anytime soon they will have to talk about the reality that they have no idea when Sho’s end is coming, but Sho can probably hear him thinking because Sho nudges him with a shoulder before saying, “Sleep,” with a soft kiss pressed to his temple.  
  
And Jun does because he’s so tired from all the thinking ever since that night at the bar and he feels so fucked out thanks to Sho holding back since forever, so he lets sleep take him, comforted by the knowledge that when he wakes up Sho will still be there.


	5. Regolith

Sho is already awake when Jun jerks awake. He quickly glances at the chronometer on Sho’s bedside table (just right beside the screwdriver) and deems that normal people aren’t supposed to be awake even at this hour. He shifts groggily and meets Sho’s amused eyes from where he’s sitting at the edge of the bed.  
  
“It’s only nine,” he tells Sho, voice hoarse from sleep and from last night, and Sho just nods, a small smile dancing on his lips.  
  
“Ugh,” Jun groans, covering his face with his hands. He’s not too awake for this. He’s never been a morning person, a fact that Nino likes to make fun of so much because once, when Jun made the mistake of letting Nino stay over because he actually believed Nino’s claim that his neighbor was, “Throwing knives at every person he sees in the corridor, I swear Jun-kun, if I die this will be on your conscience and it will follow you for life!”, Nino woke him up by playing a recorded track of someone screaming in some cheap Terran horror movie right against his ear, and the fucker had the gall to laugh when Jun threw a pillow at his head.  
  
Needless to say, he banned Nino from ever staying the night, which is probably why the imp took matters into his own hands and made a keycard duplicate of his place without his knowledge.  
  
Jun feels eyes on him and when he peers in between his fingers, Sho’s looking at him like he has something he wants to say, but can’t decide if he’ll go for it because he can’t stop looking at Jun. Jun seriously doubts he looks attractive in the morning, but Sho looks at him just so, and that’s all he needs to remove his hands from his face and just ask, “What?”  
  
Sho lets out a little laugh at that and Jun finally notices that Sho isn’t dressed, that he hasn’t even bathed yet, and Jun finds that he likes that so he extends a hand and says, “Come back here,” and Sho takes the hand and does as he’s told.  
  
He settles back beside Jun and Jun buries his face in Sho’s neck and murmurs, “Better,” making Sho laugh nervously.  
  
He’s not used to this, Jun thinks. He doubts Sho ever had time for anything like this before, where they don’t have to worry about anything at all because it’s the now part that really matters, not before, not after, not even what happens next, just now.  
  
“We need to talk,” Sho says after a moment, his fingers playing with Jun’s hair, and Jun nods against his neck.  
  
“I know.”  
  
Sho shifts a little to look at him with eyes narrowed. “You’re not making it any easier for me, you know,” he accuses Jun, but it’s playful and a little petulant that it makes Jun laugh.  
  
“Fine,” Jun acquiesces, punctuating it with a soft kiss to Sho’s neck. “Let’s talk. It’s way overdue, anyway.”  
  
Jun pulls away from him to sit up and Sho does the same. For a while neither one of them speak, they just stare at one another and let the silence stretch, Jun not knowing what to say because it’s Sho’s call, it’s Sho turn to say something, and Sho just looks at him like he’s run out of words to say.  
  
Fair enough. Jun’s aware that he has that effect on people anyway. It pleases him to no end that Sho’s not so different from almost everybody else in that aspect.  
  
Sho flexes his fingers between them, staring at the veins before clearing his throat. “I’m flaking,” he says, and Jun holds his breath, his body tensing. “I’m starting to flake around the edges. At first I thought it was nothing. I thought it was the human part developing further, but…”  
  
He pauses, worrying his lip. Jun puts a hand on Sho’s knee, tries to tell him that he’s here, he’s listening. Sho puts his hand on top of Jun’s before continuing. “The other day, I dropped a screwdriver,” and Jun’s eyes immediately search the top of the bedside table. Sho turns his head to look at what Jun’s staring at, before turning back and nodding.  
  
“It’s not a big deal, dropping one. But we’re not human so you know that that’s not supposed to happen at all,” he says in a small voice, and Jun understands. He understands because replicants are made for precision, for accuracy. Any slip, no matter how small, definitely means something. “Satoshi-kun saw it happen and he looked just as surprised as I did. That has never happened before, you see, and we both know what that means for us, for our kind,” Sho exhales, closing his eyes. Jun doesn’t know what else to do, so he keeps his hand on Sho’s knee and squeezes, an assurance that he’s here and he’s going to listen and stay until Sho kicks him out. He hopes it won’t come to that.  
  
“I don’t have long, that much is certain,” Sho says after a moment, and Jun feels like he’s being shattered into minute pieces before someone steps on him, on each piece, and keeps on doing so till the pieces become reduced to dust. He feels raw, empty, and utterly helpless. He can only imagine how Sho feels.  
  
Sho looks at him in the eye. “That’s why I held out on you, why I held myself back,” he admits and Jun freezes. Of all the reasons he thought why Sho seemed to be immune to his charms, it’s not this. He thought Sho just either had the resilience of a monk or that he’s just not fazed by Jun at all, but not this. Not because he thought to himself that he couldn’t because he doesn’t have long anyway.  
  
“Because I don’t know when I’ll die, and you don’t deserve something as messed up as that, not when…” Sho pauses, looking uncertain, and Jun braces himself for what he’s going to say next.  
  
Finally, Sho straightens, meeting his eyes head-on. “You don’t deserve this kind of complication not when you haven’t got long yourself,” he says, and Jun leans forward to kiss him for being so stupid, so fucking stupid, because only Sho will worry about him before worrying about himself. Only Sho will put somebody else before his own just because of some self-righteous bullshit he has going on.  
  
They’re so similar and that’s probably the main reason why Nino tried his best to make them meet. Being the perceptive replicant that Nino is, Jun has no doubts Nino saw Jun in Sho and vice versa, and thought that he’ll do the both of them one last favor just because.  
  
He realizes he owes Nino so many things and vows that he’ll thank him for all of that before his time comes. He has to.  
  
Sho responds to the kiss, his other hand on Jun’s neck, his thumb rubbing circles on Jun’s jaw, and Jun sighs against Sho’s lips. “I have nine months and sixteen days,” he tells Sho, who pulls back just a little to look at him, listening, but he never removes his hand on Jun’s neck and Jun appreciates that, appreciates the contact.  
  
“We don’t know how long you’ve got but it’s most likely less than I have, but don’t you say that I don’t deserve this. Don’t you decide that for yourself because only I get to decide what I deserve or not. And last night,” Jun pauses, eyes searching Sho’s, “last night obviously meant something to you as much as it did to me, so stop overthinking and just let me be where I want to be.”  
  
Sho looks at him, and this close Jun can see the fear in his eyes, the uncertainty and the doubt, and he wants Sho to just ask it, to just ask him the question just so he can put Sho’s fears to rest.  
  
He doesn’t have to wait long. “And where do you want be?” Sho asks, his voice so small and betraying him, the fear in there so real, almost tangible that Jun can probably reach out and take it.  
  
“Here,” he tells Sho, “just right here,” with you, he doesn’t say because he doesn’t think he has to. Sho probably gets it, probably understands now that Jun’s not taking off just like that, not after everything.  
  
Jun has no plans of leaving him alone in this; he knows how it feels when time creeps up on you, its breath ghosting the back of your neck leaving you mostly immobile and helpless as you just wait for it to strike. It’s death itself, and it’s the human part of them that’s terrified of it. Jun knows how powerful fear can be, it can leave you desolate if you let it in, it will consume you and leave nothing but ashes of your former self.  
  
He’s not letting Sho feel all of that on his own. He thinks he has left Sho on his own long enough, anyway. Jun’s not resigning him to his fate alone because it’s the least he can do. It’s the least he can do for the man who is selfless enough to put Jun’s best interests before his own, for the man who made Jun an offer he can’t refuse that turned out to be the best decision Jun ever made in his life.  
  
“You’re not getting rid of me that easily you know,” Jun tells him, and Sho just laughs softly before pulling him by the back of his neck to put their foreheads together.  
  
“I figured as much,” Sho says and Jun thinks as he closes his eyes to mimic Sho, we’ll be all right.  
  
\--  
  
Nino pushes the plate towards Jun, giving him a look of absolute betrayal. Jun smirks as pushes the plate back in front of Nino. It’s really not as bad as Nino makes it out to be, he thinks. It’s just the newly-discovered but still unnamed rare delicacy from Praximus VII, a green and very slimy chunk of supposedly edible flesh with tentacles that Jun bought for Nino as thanks for all his hard work.  
  
“I am not eating that,” Nino says, giving the plate a disgusted look. “No matter how many credits you blew for that thing, J, I am not eating that. It’s still alive.” And true enough, one of the tentacles rises up mid-air, much to Jun’s fascination and Nino’s horror.  
  
“Really now,” Jun tells him, smirk still in place. “I’m surprised that a piece of a tentacle monster is where you supposedly draw the line regarding the things that you put in your mouth,” and Nino scowls at him, pushing the plate back to Jun’s side of the table.  
  
“You’re just being an asshole because things went so well for you and Sho-chan,” Nino narrows his eyes at him, and Jun smiles innocently. “You’re lucky I had other things to worry about that night, that I totally didn’t mind that you didn’t call me or Aiba-shi.”  
  
Jun purses his lips. “I’m touched,” he says, relishing the fact that he can do this to Nino and not the other way around. “I didn’t know you cared that much about my, what was that, my supposedly ‘dismal chances at finding someone’ because I ‘have a stick up my ass’?” He leans forward and puts a fork through the alien delicacy in front of them, puncturing the moving tentacle before cutting a piece of it and offering it to Nino.  
  
Nino looks at the whole thing with wide eyes filled with horror and disgust. “Sadist,” he calls Jun, “you fucking sadist, Matsumoto, don’t even think about putting that fucking fork in my mouth.” He draws back and Jun smiles evilly, the kind of smile Nino did when he told Jun he duplicated the apartment keycard without Jun’s knowledge.  
  
“One bite and you’re entitled to one question about how it went,” he offers, knowing it’s something Nino can’t refuse, not when he’s such a nosy little shit in Jun’s life, and Jun swears he can see the gears turning in Nino’s head as Nino considers the merit of the offer.  
  
Nino is still glaring at him when he reaches out and takes the fork from Jun’s hand, and Jun howls in laughter at the face he made when he finally ate the thing. Nino looks like he’s going to be sick, chewing slowly.  
  
“Fuck you,” he tells Jun, “it’s still alive, oh god, I can feel it suctioning at the roof of my mouth, fuck.” He groans, and he looks so pitiful that Jun just laughs and laughs at his face.  
  
Jun whips out his pad and records Nino’s reactions as a holo and sends it to Sho with a note of, ‘made him eat the slime tentacle you told me about’ before Nino can stop him.  
  
Nino swallows with difficulty before leaning back on his seat to give Jun the finger, and Jun just giggles. “I’m never eating one more bite of that,” Nino declares, shooting the plate a look of utmost hate, probably wishing it will disintegrate to nothingness if he looks at it hard enough.  
  
“Fine with me,” Jun says with a nod. “Ask,” he prompts, and Nino looks thoughtful for a moment, weighing his options. Jun knows how hard it’ll be for him to settle with just one question because this is Nino and it’s the Aiba in him that makes him so curious, so inquisitive to the point of being meddlesome at times.  
  
Then again, it’s Nino’s meddling that made a lot of things possible, things that Jun didn’t even consider before and thought he had no time for, only to be proven wrong, so it’s not mostly a bad thing.  
  
“I’m going to ask the best question I thought of and let’s be clear about this,” Nino says, spreading his palms across the table, “you’re to answer me as honestly and as concise as you can because if you leave out just one thing, just one fucking important tiny detail Matsumoto Jun, I will shove that goddamn alien monster between us down your throat along with the plate. I’m not kidding.”  
  
Technically, it is Jun who made the offer so he can’t find himself to hate Nino for it. He, after all, was the one who made Nino eat what Sho told him as, “supposedly disgusting, Satoshi-kun said he tried to eat it and he immediately spat it back out.”  
  
Jun crosses his arms over his chest and braces himself, leaning back against his chair. “Shoot.”  
  
Nino looks at him strangely, like he didn’t just threaten Jun with force feeding of alien delicacy. Finally, he just sighs and asks, “Are you happy?” his eyes suddenly full of concern for Jun.  
  
Jun is so surprised by the question that he blinks, twice, three times before letting it sink in. He expected Nino will make him deliver a really detailed account of how the night at the marketplace went and how things went after. He expected Nino to ask the nosy things only Nino can seem to think about because he’s Nino.  
  
He forgot that before anything else, before Nino is the greatest thorn in his life, Nino is also his closest thing to a friend, even a brother.  
  
“Yes,” he answers in a small voice. He’s actually happy, he’s never really felt happiness that can last for days before and it’s something new but it’s something comforting that actually makes him look forward to the days to come, unlike before that he lived each day just waiting impatiently for the next, for something different to happen and he ends up so disappointed that he ends up dreading the end of his time.  
  
It’s nothing like that anymore.  
  
Nino leans back and tilts his head at him. “That’s all I want to know, really,” he says earnestly and Jun wonders if other people are as lucky as him, that he has someone he can confide in as well as someone he can walk with towards the end together. He supposes not.  
  
Nino pulls out the keycard duplicate to Jun’s apartment from his pocket and slides it across the table to Jun’s side. “Give that to Sho-yan, will you?” he says, smiling. “Tell him it’s a present from me and that I don’t have any use for it anymore.” He winks at Jun before giving him a salute, and Jun takes the card gratefully. Only Nino will know what to do next when Jun is still fumbling his way around. Only Nino will give him a shove when he simply thinks he needs a push.  
  
“Now,” Nino says, clapping his hands. “How about you repay my gesture of goodwill by getting me a hamburger steak? Lord knows I’m not eating any more of that goddamn green abomination right there,” and Jun just shakes his head, a smile on his face, before doing just that.  
  
\--  
  
Jun spends the following weeks alternating between his place and Sho’s, and in that time, he gets to know more about Sho more than the man ever let him on. He learns that the reason Sho has some spare shuttlecraft parts in his apartment is that he’s working on the warp improvement in flight conduits, because apparently, that’s the problem most shuttles heading for Messier 81 have encountered on the way, and if it happens mid-space travel, it can be seriously life-threatening.  
  
He learns that Sho possesses little to no culinary knowledge, but he eats with such relish and appreciation and is not embarrassed to compliment the food in front of him every now and then. He learns that Sho likes to reward him with kisses, because when Jun made an Orion special pasta with olives for Sho, Sho gives him a series of short repeated kisses, the ones he knows Jun likes best as thanks.  
  
He learns that Sho only used Ohno’s name during that time in the night market to hide the fact that he himself adores shellfish. When Jun confronts Sho about it Sho just shrugs and says that at that time he couldn’t tell Jun that because he still had reservations. Jun smiles at the still part of Sho’s admission and proceeds to make a shellfish-centric kind of meal the following evening. Not the eighty thousand rip-off, no, Jun’s not that generous, but still something pricey. The look on Sho’s face as he sampled the dish was worth it, Jun thinks.  
  
Sho can apparently play the piano too, and Jun finds out about this when he’s looking in his personal access pad for an instrument he can purchase just to learn how to play something that’s not part of what he’s made for. He learns about it when Sho flops beside him with a kiss to his shoulder, his eyes already scanning Jun’s pad.  
  
“Who taught you?” he asks Sho with a nudge, and Sho just shrugs his shoulders before saying, “It’s just like coding, you know?” and no, Jun doesn’t know, because he wasn’t built to code things, he wasn’t built for subroutines like Sho. He was built for pleasure, something he likes showing Sho almost every night, and honestly, something he’s sure Sho likes to be reminded of almost every time if Jun takes into account how Sho sounds every time Jun helps him come undone with just his mouth, his hands, his fingers, his touch.  
  
He learns that Sho wasn’t lying about how much he likes the necklace, because one time Jun wore it just to see how it looks on him and Sho runs out of his room, looking really panicked, only to sigh in relief once he sees the red troostite around Jun’s neck. Jun smiles innocently, and Sho just pulls him for a kiss before whispering, “I’m actually jealous that it looks better on you,” against Jun’s ear, making him laugh.  
  
He also finds out that the reason Sho is in shipyard work is that the idea of intergalactic space travel always fascinated him, to the point he wanted to be a part of it, no matter how small that part is. Jun never thought about leaving, not even once, but Sho apparently thinks of it every now and then, and the recent developments in Messier 81 are only making him more interested and more open to the idea.  
  
He learns that someday Sho wants to see what it’s like to be a part of a starting colony, to build everything from scratch similar to what he does in the shipyard from time to time, that Sho wants to see the rest of what’s out there because there’s so much out there and you can only get to see so little of it in such a short time.  
  
It’s what puts the idea in Jun’s head that what if, just _what if_ he ventures out there with Sho, taking only what they need, start something there and remain there till the end? They still have time. He has never considered leaving Praximus before and he remembers what Sho told him the first time he made Jun fix a busted flight circuit, that at that time, no, he had no plans of leaving, but who’s to say he won’t entertain the thought in the future?  
  
It’s all Sho’s fault, Jun realizes. He’s starting to think of things he never paid any attention to before, he’s starting to do things he never considered doing before, all because Sho’s making him see things he’s never seen before because he never bothered to stop and look, to pay attention.  
  
Jun minimizes the number of clients he’s accepting on a weekly basis to make time for Sho, and Sho does the same with his shipyard commitments which Ohno helpfully agrees to without second thought. Nino just rubs his palms together greedily when Jun informed him of the decision, exclaiming, “No rest for the wicked, indeed!” and Jun just rolls his eyes, already knowing that Nino’s most likely calculating the increase in his earnings now that Jun’s dropping some clients in his hands. After all, who else can Jun trust, really, other than Nino?  
  
That adjustment in their schedules gives them a lot of time together, and Jun hopes it’s more than enough.  
  
December comes, and Praximus is adapting the Terran custom of Christmas celebrations, so the metropolis is filled with decorations appropriate for the season. It doesn’t snow on Praximus, but the temperature does slightly decrease during nighttime, adding to the ambience of the season.  
  
Sho is reading intergalactic news on his own display pad when Jun asks him, “What do you want for Christmas?” because he’s at a loss on what to give Sho. Sho obviously liked the necklace but that was a spur of the moment thing, a gut feeling Jun just went for that luckily hit the mark.  
  
Besides, Jun has no experience of wanting to give something special to someone before, so he really needs all help he can get. His maker obviously had something about Christmas because for some unknown reason Jun understands the importance of the holiday for Terrans and he feels like he can share the sentiment and that he won’t be lying if he says so.  
  
“Nothing really,” Sho says, tilting his head to look at Jun, and great, just splendid, that’s exactly the answer Jun really needs at the moment. He raises an eyebrow at Sho because Sho’s really not making this any easier and it’s so like him to do that, because honestly, that’s the way Sho’s been doing it for Jun ever since. Never the easy way out, always the ‘you might have to go around the back’ kind of approach.  
  
It’s what makes Sho a really compelling teacher because he’s the type that always poses a challenge to Jun, knowing how irresistible Jun finds that kind of approach. It’s also what makes Sho Sho, and if Jun’s being completely honest he won’t have Sho any other way.  
  
He’s just annoyed because Sho obviously knows this much to know that if Jun says, “I really hate you so much right now,” he doesn’t mean it, that that’s just his way of trying to play it cool because there’s no way in hell Jun’s going to admit that he’s so far gone and already so deep in this. Not yet.  
  
He decides to ask Nino about it, which is apparently a very wrong move and poor thinking on his part because Nino just laughs and laughs and Jun wants to strangle him for being such a jackass when all he needs right now is a friend.  
  
“You’re seriously consulting me on what you can give your boyfriend this Christmas?” Nino says, eyes full of glee. “Really? Oh my god, Jun-kun!” and Jun wants to hit him with anything, anything just to inflict damage on Nino, so he settles for kicking him under the table.  
  
Nino just laughs and shakes a finger in front of him. “And please, before you even think of denying anything, don’t bother,” he warns. “We all know that the only thing missing in Sho-yan’s contact info in your pad is a kiss mark right beside his name, or worse, a fucking blinking heart, so spare me your attempts at being cool.”  
  
And that does it, Jun vows that he will never speak to Nino about it ever again.  
  
He considers asking Aiba, but Aiba is the one who made Nino and he will undoubtedly also laugh at Jun’s current predicament because like maker like android, and seriously, Jun hates the both of them so much because they’re the ones who basically thought of this thing with Sho (okay, technically it is Nino, but he’s an Aiba product so Jun considers it joint responsibility) and yet they’re being completely unhelpful. So he doesn’t call Aiba, deeming him as the worst case scenario if by the 24th Jun still hasn’t got anything.  
  
Jun is so troubled about finding something suitable for the occasion that even Sho notices it, because he nudges Jun one time when Jun didn’t answer quick enough regarding a question before saying, “Seriously, don’t worry about it,” and that’s just really brilliant, because now Jun is really worrying about it, because this is their first and last Christmas together and he needs to make the occasion memorable.  
  
Doesn’t Sho get that?  
  
Sho does actually, because when Jun throws him the question of, “What are you getting me, anyway?” Sho just looks at him coolly before smiling and saying, “I already got you something, but of course you have to wait till you can have it,” and Jun is seriously panicking now.  
  
In his desperation he finds himself in the shipyard one time, hoping to observe Sho in his work environment once more just to think of something suitable, and when he finds Ohno Satoshi instead, he feels like hitting himself because how come he didn’t think of asking this man before? There’s a reason Sho calls him ‘Satoshi-kun’, after all.  
  
Ohno blinks at him when Jun asks, “Do you know what Sho can possibly want for the 25th?” and he doesn’t speak for a while that Jun almost repeated the question, then Ohno is tilting his head at him before he’s saying, “Dirt,” and Jun’s eyes widen, his mouth going slack.  
  
“What,” he says, because he thinks he can’t have heard that right. Did Ohno just say that Sho wants dirt for Christmas? What the hell?  
  
Ohno just nods earnestly. “Dirt,” he repeats in the same tone he used earlier, meanwhile looking at Jun with so much patience in his eyes, waiting for Jun to say more.  
  
Jun recovers from the shock and he clears his throat. “What do you mean dirt?”  
  
Ohno shrugs. “It’s not just any dirt, Matsumoto-san,” he explains, flicking his fingers at the screen of his pad to search for something, and soon enough, he’s showing Jun a piece of news regarding the discovery that one of the satellites of Regulus XIV, the latest addition to the Regilian colonies, has soil they deemed to be viable for any kind of Terran life. Regilian regolith, they called it. It’s basically a scientific breakthrough considering that most satellites possess little to no atmospheric conditions, and yet, here’s one that’s capable of sustaining life as the people of Earth know it.  
  
He looks up at Ohno, who’s holding the pad for him and waiting patiently till he finishes reading. “What does Sho want to do with it?” he asks, frown forming on his face.  
  
Ohno tucks the pad back under his arm, smiling a little. He looks so kind, Jun thinks. No wonder Sho has always regarded Ohno with such respect; no wonder Sho treats him as a friend. He has that air of someone who understands more than he lets people on, and Jun finds his initial perception of Ohno as the sleepy, tanned foreman of the main shipyard to be so very wrong and so lacking.  
  
There’s so much more to this man than meets the eye.  
  
“Sho-kun likes these things,” Ohno explains, his fondness for Sho evident in his voice. “He’s so interested in the idea of life out there, you know? He’s so interested with the idea of life itself, he was really thrilled about this piece of news when he showed it to me recently.”  
  
Jun never knew that. Sure, he knows Sho wants to venture into deep space someday, find life in other colonies, but he never thought that the reason Sho wants to do it is that he’s enamored with the idea of life and living. He thought it was for far more selfish reasons, like Praximus being inadequate and full of memories that hit too close to home, or that he just wants to start over.  
  
“Where can I get this?” he finds himself asking Ohno, who smiles at him genially, and Jun feels like he can hug the man right now.  
  
Ohno forwards him the address of a shop that specializes in taking orders for intergalactic artifacts, and they promise Jun a small vial of the dirt, but for a hefty price. When he asks Ohno how he knew of the place, Ohno just shrugs his shoulders and says, “I go to them when I need bait. For fishing,” and Jun leaves it at that, remembering that conversation with Sho in the night market about Ohno’s supposed interest for all kinds of marine life.  
  
Jun pays for the order in full and they promise to get the vial to him three days before Christmas. Before Jun can decide against it, he also orders a package of the most recommended kinds of fish bait, and tells them to send it to a man named Ohno Satoshi along with his thanks.  
  
\--  
  
Aiba sends him a holo that is apparently for Sho as well (why Aiba didn’t send them separately, he doesn’t know, but he has an inkling it has something to do about Aiba being Aiba), because when he opens it beside Sho, Aiba greets the both of them with his usual cheer.  
  
“Hello Matsujun, hello Sho-chan!” Aiba says, waving enthusiastically, followed by his poor attempt at winking which Sho chuckles at.  
  
It’s an invitation to dinner at Aiba’s home that's somewhere close to the edge of the city, on Christmas Eve because it’s also Aiba's birthday at that time. When Jun checks the other recipients of the holo, he finds Nino’s contact information there, as well as an unregistered number that Sho recognizes: Ohno’s. Jun almost asked how Aiba and Ohno knew each other, until he remembered Aiba’s incident with the crazed hovercar driver.  
  
“Did he really cause such a ruckus at that time?” he asks Sho, who laughs at the memory before nodding. “Yes, Satoshi-kun kept apologizing to the driver despite it not being his fault while I hauled Aiba-chan away from the scene.”  
  
Jun frowns. “Does he know everyone? Aiba, I mean,” and Sho just smiles before grabbing Jun’s pad and confirming that yes, they’ll be there, before Jun can say anything about it.  
  
“Please tell me you want to go because you want to go, not because you thought I want to,” he tells Sho, and Sho just leans forward to give him a peck on the lips before saying, “We’re going because I want to be there with you,” and Jun drops the subject at that, his hands already moving around Sho’s neck, drawing Sho in.  
  
He pushes Sho back against the couch before kissing his way down, and soon he’s unfastening Sho’s belt and undoing the button of his pants, Sho whimpering above him. He feels Sho still protesting despite Jun already pushing his pants down to his legs, followed by his boxers, and confirms it when Sho says, “You don’t really have to—“ but gets cut off because that’s when Jun swipes a hot tongue at Sho’s already interested cock, before looking up at Sho and pumping him with his hand.  
  
“You’re right, I don’t. But I want to,” he tells Sho, and Sho tightens his fingers in Jun’s hair as Jun swallows him back down, his other hand wrapped around Sho’s shaft and the other clutching tight at Sho’s thigh for support.  
  
Jun presses series after series of open mouthed kisses on Sho's cock, his tongue flicking once in a while to tease Sho further, before shifting the hand he has on Sho's shaft to pump the length. He pulls his mouth away to watch Sho as his hand continues to provide friction, squeezing and flicking his wrist expertly, his thumb rubbing the tip once in a while. Jun makes sure he also leans forward from time to time to give a lick or two at the head and he hears Sho make a pleased groan, Sho's breath coming out in gasps as he clings to the couch and to Jun.  
  
He continues teasing Sho, flicking his tongue every now and then at the swollen head, his thumb now tracing the vein on the underside of Sho’s cock. Sho whimpers, and Jun’s certain that’s the sound of Sho asking for something but he refuses to relent. Not yet, he thinks. Jun moistens his lips before wrapping them at the head, making sure that the tip of his tongue is right against the slit. He tongues at the heated flesh repeatedly till he's tasting a bit of Sho and Sho wails, something that sounds like his name and Jun has to pull back just to laugh a little.  
  
"Please," Sho says, and he's breathless and begging with his legs spread and quivering and his cock fully interested that the sight of it all makes Jun press a kiss to his thigh.  
  
He meets Sho’s eyes before wrapping his lips around Sho again. He observes carefully how Sho can’t seem to decide to watch him or close his eyes at the sight, so he hums, mouth going slack, accommodating more of Sho and Sho’s other hand brushes at his cheekbone, stroking lightly. Jun knows that Sho loves this, loves looking at him like this with his mouth stretched obscenely around Sho’s cock, loves the feeling of him swallowing Sho whole.  
  
Jun decides to slide back down again, slowly at first before doing it faster. He makes sure to take Sho a little deeper each time and that’s all it takes for Sho’s control to finally _snap_ , then he’s fucking into Jun’s mouth with abandon, and Jun just kneels between Sho’s legs and takes it, the slide of Sho’s cock in and out of his mouth smooth and easy.  
  
Naturally, Jun wasn’t built with a gag reflex. Naturally.  
  
For a while there's nothing but slick sounds and Sho's repeated groans of Jun's name followed by a swear or two, then Sho’s grip in his hair tightens and soon he’s saying, “I— Jun—“ and it’s all the warning Jun gets before Sho’s coming hard inside his mouth and down his throat, and Jun just lets him ride the wave of orgasm. Jun pulls back a little, his mouth still wrapped around the head as he pumps Sho through the aftershocks of it, until all Sho can do is slump against the couch, his breath coming in gasps.  
  
Jun finally pulls away, licking his overused and tender lips, and he catches Sho’s eyes following the movement. Jun grins at him, the grin full of childish innocence that he gives Sho immediately after he’s done something particularly mischievous and Sho just sighs in defeat. Honestly, Jun thinks, Sho should know by now that he is the type who never lets an opportunity slip from his grasp.  
  
If that involves making Sho utterly speechless and turning him to an illiterate from time to time, then Jun will do that just because the opportunity presents itself.  
  
He calls it making the most out of it. Sho simply calls it as “Jun being Jun”.  
  
Jun stands up to grab some tissues from the nearby table, dabbing them at the corners of his own mouth. He returns to clean Sho off, before helping Sho arrange himself because Sho apparently still hasn’t regained motor control yet. Jun keeps a cocky smirk on his face because Sho looking like this is his proof right now. Of course he’s that good. Of course he can do that much without even exerting any semblance of effort.  
  
“Do you want me to—?” Sho asks suddenly. Jun sees Sho looking at his pants which are obviously straining against his erection, and Jun steals a kiss before helping Sho stand up, already leading him towards the bathroom.  
  
“Yes,” Jun says, still grinning, his hand never letting go of Sho’s. “In the shower, right now, with me.”  
  
\--  
  
Christmas Eve arrives, and he and Sho find themselves standing in front of a single unit apartment, and it looks so normal that for a moment he wonders if Aiba got the address of his own home wrong.  
  
With Aiba, anything’s possible, no matter how absurd it is.  
  
The one who opens the door for them when Sho rang the doorbell is Nino, whose face splits to a huge grin at the sight of him with Sho, and Jun narrows his eyes at him in warning, in case Nino makes a crude comment. They're still on the doorstep, after all.  
  
Nino just steps aside, like it’s his home they’ve arrived at before shutting the door and shouting, “Aiba-shi, Jun-kun and Sho-yan are here!” to which Aiba responds with a distinct clang of kitchenware somewhere inside the house.  
  
Jun almost facepalms, Sho just laughs, and Nino pointedly sighs. “Leave him alone and it’s a miracle he hasn’t blown himself to bits yet,” Nino says with a click of his tongue, but his fondness for Aiba is so obvious in his eyes that Jun knows there’s no true annoyance in that statement. “Are you all right there?” Nino asks loudly, and Aiba just answers back with a, “Yeah, don’t worry about it!” as loud as he can.  
  
Jun steps inside, toeing his shoes off first before heading straight for Aiba’s living room. He wonders when Aiba got the time to actually decorate this place. It looks lived in, he’d give it that, and it gives off the atmosphere of a home that Jun never felt before in his life. He looks around, and on the wall he sees a framed collection of different rocks and upon further inspection, they turned out to be rock samples from each of the eight moons of Praximus V. On its right, there’s a framed collection of rock samples from the Orion Nebula.  
  
Turns out that he might be right about that exaggerated comment he once made that Aiba’s off collecting satellite rocks.  
  
“Are we the last to arrive?” he hears Sho ask Nino, and Nino hums. “No. Oh-chan probably got lost again,” he says, and Jun frowns before turning around.  
  
“Oh-chan?” he repeats, and Nino raises an eyebrow. “Do you actually know everyone?” because that’s one nickname for Ohno he never heard anyone use before, until now.  
  
Then again, he remembers that Sho told him that everyone knows Nino, from where he’s from. But still.  
  
Nino just grins. “You underestimate how far my connection stretches, Jun-kun. Of course I know. I don’t know about ‘everyone’, but whatever you think I don’t know, hell, I probably do,” he says with a wink.  
  
Jun tilts his chin up at Nino. “That reminds me,” he says, looking at Sho first before turning back to Nino. “I haven’t asked how you two know each other.”  
  
“Ah,” Nino says, looking thoughtful, then his expression shifts and suddenly he’s leering at Jun. “What, getting possessive now, J? Wanting to know if I, Ninomiya Kazunari, the alleged intergalactic slut, not my terms, mind you, did whatever it is that took you almost three months and an innumerable amount of shuttles to fix? Wanting to know if my reputation is really something I try so hard to maintain and not just something that precedes me?”  
  
“Nino,” Sho says, and it’s said in that brotherly kind of admonishing tone that Jun relaxes.  
  
“No, I haven’t fucked him in the past if that’s what you want to know,” Nino finally says with a wave of his hand, and beside him Sho lets out a small laugh before looking at Jun directly.  
  
“I met him when I asked Aiba-chan for a deadline,” Sho explains, probably deciding it’s best to just say it since it’s bound to happen sooner instead of later, anyway.  
  
“And I was there because that’s the time I just got Aiba-shi out of the fucking stargate penitentiary,” Nino says. “Imagine, I just got a former penitentiary convict out of the quadrant hellhole and this guy,” he points at Sho with his thumb, “suddenly comes barging in demanding a date. Rude of him, wasn’t it?”  
  
“Terribly,” Jun agrees, looking at Sho, and he smiles at the sight of Sho blushing slightly.  
  
The doorbell rings and Nino sighs before saying, “I’ll get it, that’s probably Oh-chan anyway,” leaving Jun and Sho in the living room.  
  
“I’m never letting you join forces with Nino again,” Sho says, breaking the silence. “You two can probably commit a lot of crimes and get away with it with no problem.”  
  
Jun grins. “You’re forgetting Aiba. I don’t think you can end up in the stargate penitentiary alive, but lo and behold, he actually did it.”  
  
Sho’s smiling back now. “Well, that’s Aiba for you,” he says, then he’s turning around and giving Ohno a nod before a greeting of, “Satoshi-kun,” to which Ohno replies with a rather enthusiastic “Sho-kun!” of his own, then he’s nodding at Jun in acknowledgement.  
  
“Yes, yes, that’s endearing,” Nino says, walking between Ohno and Sho. “What the hell happened to the food, anyway?” he asks out loud, and Jun pales a bit.  
  
“You let Aiba cook our food?” Jun asks, a little horrified at the idea. The man might be a genius, but he does tend to get overexcited and whenever that happens, it's always up to someone else to fix the mess. Usually it's Nino. Jun has heard enough stories from Nino about his maker, and that's not counting the stargate penitentiary bit yet.  
  
Nino gives him a look. “I reckoned it won’t be as bad as that alien tentacle you force fed me,” he explains, obviously still holding a grudge, and Sho laughs, probably remembering the holo Jun sent him as Nino ate the green slimy thing from Praximus VII.  
  
That seems to get Ohno’s attention. He looks at Nino with surprise, eyes going wide. “You ate that?” Ohno asks him, and this time, Nino glares at Jun before answering, “Jun-kun made me eat it because he’s a sadistic bastard who loves power to the point of potential tyranny. Isn’t the idea terrifying?”  
  
Jun almost dignified that with a response, almost, but something suddenly smells burnt from the kitchen and he meets Nino’s eyes in alarm.  
  
“Aiba-shi, please tell me we’re not going to explode any moment and that the authorities are not going to sweep our combined spare parts and innards just in time for tomorrow’s morning headlines. Please!” Nino exclaims, and Jun’s already moving to the direction to the kitchen, just to see how bad things are.  
  
He hears Aiba’s reply of, “We’re not going to die!” when he reaches the kitchen, and Jun thinks Aiba’s probably right about that, they’re not going to die from explosion, but they’re probably going to die of food poisoning any time soon. Nothing edible can smell like that and that’s a general consensus regardless of what galaxy you’re in, Jun’s certain of it.  
  
“Seriously, what have you done this time?” he asks Aiba, hands on his hips. For his part, Aiba just looks sheepish, though he’s still smiling. Jun thinks he won’t have Aiba any other way, he’d rather have him concoct something potentially dangerous and life-threatening with a smile than have him look crestfallen simply because the world failed him.  
  
“Nothing that warrants getting imprisoned, I think,” Aiba says with a smile, and Jun just sighs.  
  
“You mean nothing that warrants getting imprisoned yet. You haven’t killed any of us yet, after all,” he says and Aiba punches him playfully on the arm.  
  
Obviously, what Aiba makes is no longer suitable for human and replicant consumption so Jun takes over for him and whips out a pasta dish with whatever’s available. It doesn’t smell as good as it usually does, having lacking a few ingredients and improvising here and there but at least it still smells like food and that’s the goal here, after Aiba’s alarming attempt at what he claimed to be a Regilian specialty.  
  
“Go,” he tells Aiba, “I can handle this, birthday boy. Ohno-san’s already arrived, anyway,” and Aiba looks at him gratefully before Aiba leans to kiss his cheek in thanks. Jun shoots him a surprised look and Aiba just grins, darting just in time to evade whatever blow Jun planned to retaliate with before running hurriedly out of the kitchen. Jun wipes the side of his face with his shoulder, and not very long after he hears Aiba’s excited exclaim of, “Leader!”  
  
Jun can only guess that Aiba meant Ohno. Clearly, he’s the only one in the group who doesn’t seem to know Ohno that much. He thinks that something should be done about that and it better start tonight. After all, Ohno is the reason he has a small vial of Regilian regolith in his pocket, a small green sprout at the center of an orange-colored dust.  
  
He turns back to the pasta, mixing it with precision and flipping the noodles in the pan with skill. Outside, he hears Nino’s screams of, “I can’t believe you did that!” followed Aiba’s gleeful laughter, and he knows that they’re all right, they’re having their usual fun so he turns his focus on cooking instead. He’s so preoccupied with his task that he almost lets out a tiny shriek when he feels arms suddenly wrapping around his waist.  
  
“Shh, calm down,” Sho whispers against his ear, a smile on his face. Jun forgot how light Sho can be in his steps if he puts his mind to it.  
  
Jun turns his head to glare at him, but Sho simply says, “That seriously smells good though,” his eyes on what Jun is making.  
  
“Aren’t you supposed to be out there? What are they doing, anyway?” he asks, and Sho kisses the side of his neck before replying, “There’s this interactive spatial role-playing game that Aiba-chan has and they’re all playing it, trying their best to knock each other off the board every round.”  
  
That explains Nino’s accusations of cheating every now and then. “All except you,” he points out, and Sho just shrugs.  
  
“Well, they wanted to know how long the food is going to take.”  
  
“And they sent you? Let me guess, Aiba wanted to know, Nino told you to go and check on me?”  
  
Sho grins against his neck, his breath ghosting Jun’s skin and making the hair there stand. “It’s the other way around, actually,” he tells Jun, and that’s just great because now Jun can’t focus on even stirring the goddamn pasta with Sho so close by.  
  
Jun bets this is exactly why Aiba sent Sho in and Aiba probably did it while wiggling his eyebrows, because subtlety was never a skill Aiba learned and that is something he successfully transferred to Nino.  
  
“Do they know that you’re actually not very helpful with the kitchen?” Jun asks, trying his best to control and even out his voice.  
  
Sho hums near his ear. “Not really my fault if you get distracted that easily,” he says, absolutely refusing to take responsibility.  
  
Jun decides not to let Sho damage his ego any further, so he denies it. “I’m not distracted,” he claims, stirring the pasta with such force that the metal tongs he’s holding clangs distinctly against the pan.  
  
“No?” Sho confirms before he’s reaching out and turning the stove off, his fingers moving to grip Jun’s chin and tilt his face sideways, then Sho’s suddenly kissing him insistently, all heat and passion like they're not in Aiba's kitchen. Jun gasps in surprise and that’s all Sho needs to be able to slip his tongue inside and taste Jun.  
  
Jun responds, one of his hands moving upward to cup the back of Sho’s neck and allowing Sho to deepen the kiss. Soon he’s moaning in Sho’s mouth, heat pooling in his groin, and he's pretty sure Sho's doing the same too. He places his other hand on top of Sho's arm that's wrapped around his waist, his thumb rubbing circles on Sho's knuckles.  
  
They spring apart when someone pointedly coughs behind them. Jun refuses to meet Nino’s eyes and from the corner of his eye, he sees Sho touching his own lips sheepishly. Jun turns the stove back on and goes back to stirring ingredients as if nothing happened just now.  
  
Nino’s grinning, that much is certain. Jun can hear it in his voice. “Aiba-shi asked you to check on how the pasta’s doing, Sho-chan,” he says, stressing out Sho’s name sweetly, “not to check on how Jun-kun is doing, in which case, I believe the answer would be, ‘he’s doing just fine, spectacular even’.” The sarcasm in his voice is so rich and Jun almost turns around, but from his periphery he can see how embarrassed Sho is, and he finds that he enjoys looking at that because really, Sho’s the culprit here and he’s just the unsuspecting victim.  
  
Nino seems to sense this line of thinking because the next thing he says is, “You better tell me that that food is coming soon, Matsumoto. I don’t care if Sho-yan came in here to molest you, if that food isn’t done in five minutes, I’m going to tell Aiba-shi you’re making out in his kitchen and you can bet that by the end of this birthday party he will have a holo of the two of you actually doing it.”  
  
Before Jun can say something about that, he sees Nino hurrying out of the kitchen and hears him say, “It’s almost done!” to both Aiba and Ohno in the living room, said probably as loud as he can to tell Jun that he wasn’t kidding with the threat. He suddenly feels lucky that it was Nino who checked up on them and not Aiba, because the holo threat is very real and a very Aiba thing to do.  
  
Sho clears his throat beside him and Jun still refuses to look at him because this is all Sho’s fault. He feels Sho’s arms wrap around his waist again, then Sho’s kissing his temple with a, “Sorry about that,” but he doesn’t sound sorry at all that Jun doesn’t dignify him with a response.  
  
“I’ll go,” Sho mumbles after Jun didn’t even spare him a glance, then he’s letting go of Jun and stepping back. Jun almost lets him leave the kitchen without saying anything, almost, but this is Sho and there’s a reason why only him can easily shatter Jun’s concentration.  
  
“I’ll see you later,” Jun murmurs, and he hears Sho stop by the kitchen’s entrance, hears the smile that’s obviously on his face when he answers with a, “You better.”  
  
With Sho gone, Jun can finally return to the task at hand and he finishes it with exactly a minute and nineteen seconds to spare from Nino’s time limit of five minutes, much to Nino’s chagrin.  
  
\--  
  
Dinner turns out to be a really noisy affair, because while Ohno Satoshi is a man of few words, Aiba and Nino are certainly not, and they spent most of the time bantering with one another, contradicting each other when Aiba tries to tell a story and Nino claims that he embellishes it so much to the point it’s no longer true. A part of Jun feels envious that Nino has that kind of relationship with his maker, but at the same time he’s happy because Nino wouldn’t be Nino without Aiba, and the fact that they get along so well is the assurance Jun needs that when he asks Sho something tonight and if Sho says yes, Aiba and Nino will be all right.  
  
Jun learns that the reason Aiba was sent in the stargate penitentiary is that Aiba responded with a, “Who do you think you are, anyway?” when a Praximus patrol officer asked him what he’s doing so late at night, because apparently, there’s a curfew in this side of Praximus, not like the side of the city Jun and Nino live in. Said patrol officer apparently didn’t like Aiba’s tone very much, so he sent him to the penitentiary instead of the local prison to knock some sense into him.  
  
Aiba then calls the first person he can think of (“Should I be flattered about that?” Nino asks in the middle of the story), and Nino says the only reason he went to Aiba’s rescue is that Aiba sounded very much like an abandoned puppy, and he didn’t have the heart to listen to something like that because while he may be a cold-blooded, heartless bastard most of the time, he’s not a cold-blooded, heartless bastard all of the time.  
  
Jun also learns another side to the story of Aiba’s adventures with the crazed hovercar driver from Ohno’s perspective, and Ohno claims that was the only time he had to apologize for two very unique things: one, for something he didn’t do, and two, for someone he didn’t even know at the time.  
  
Ohno, Jun finds out, becomes a completely different man when inebriated, because from the usually quiet and reserved human he becomes really affectionate and so sensitive that he smiles at every single thing and almost cries at a mere mention of a sad thing.  
  
Aiba’s no different from Ohno, really. Only that Aiba becomes extra clingy when drunk, so he wraps his arms around everyone before planting kisses on their cheeks (“Yuck!” Nino exclaims at one point before wiping his cheek furiously. He’s drunk too, Jun realizes) and telling them how much he loves each and every one of them over and over.  
  
He hugs Jun so tight and tells him to, “Take care of Sho-chan, okay?” before moving to Sho and embracing him too, telling him, “You take care of Matsujun, you hear me?” like a doting parent and Jun just sighs at the sight. Aiba then moves to Nino and ruffles his hair, much to Nino’s annoyance, and Nino’s batting his hands away and saying, “This is why I hate making you drink anything, you become absolutely insufferable!” before running away from Aiba’s clutches.  
  
Sometime in the night, Ohno is dozing off on Aiba’s couch, murmuring about sea breams in his sleep, Aiba’s somewhere close by, asleep but still nuzzling a tub of beer and Nino’s leaning against one of Aiba’s legs, looking ready to drift any moment.  
  
Jun’s a little drunk too, his cheeks a little flushed, so he’s a little unsteady when he pulls Sho with him to the balcony, the night breeze making his skin tingle. Jun’s inner timer tells him it’s a little over midnight, so it’s Christmas already, and he fumbles a little with his breast pocket for Sho’s present.  
  
Okay, so maybe he’s not just a little drunk.  
  
“Hah!” he makes a triumphant noise when he finally gets the vial out of his pocket, and he’s looking at Sho before he says, “Merry Christmas,” opening his palm. The small vial lies in the center, its bright orange sand a contrast to the color of Jun’s skin, and he watches as Sho’s eyes widen in recognition.  
  
“How did you get this?” Sho asks in slight disbelief, but he’s already smiling. Jun tilts his head towards the apartment.  
  
“The small tanned foreman friend of yours who is currently dozing off in Aiba-san’s couch kindly lent me hand.”  
  
Sho laughs a little before taking the vial from Jun’s hand and examining it, his eyes shining with obvious interest. Jun didn’t think Sho would like it that much; perhaps he owes Ohno Satoshi another package of expensive yet exquisite fish bait?  
  
“Thank you,” Sho says, leaning forward to kiss the corner of Jun’s lips. Before Jun can try to deepen the kiss however, Sho’s moving away and he laughs when Jun pouts, before fishing a long, thin box from his pants pocket.  
  
Sho opens the box and Jun blinks at the content inside, seeing a necklace which is not too different from the one he gave Sho. It’s not troostite however, its color far from the distinct redness Jun has come to associate with Sho.  
  
“It’s willemite, actually,” Sho explains, removing the necklace from the box. “Troostite is a variety of willemite, and, well,” he ends awkwardly, undoing the clasps of the necklace before offering it to Jun, who turns around and lets Sho put it on him.  
  
Jun touches the pendant for a moment, examining how the dark mineral stands out against his skin. Trust Sho to get him something as sentimental as this. No wonder Sho boasted he already found a present for Jun when Jun asked him that one time.  
  
He takes a deep breath, hoping to clear his head. “Thanks,” he tells Sho, who looks at the pendant before meeting Jun’s eyes. Jun steps forward in Sho’s space, putting his arms around Sho’s neck.  
  
“There’s something I need to ask you,” he tells Sho, who slightly freezes at the abrupt change in topic. But Jun can’t wait, this can’t wait, not when Jun’s already made up his mind and he wants to know what Sho will say.  
  
“And I just need you to answer as truthfully as you can, just yes or no.”  
  
Sho nods slowly, his eyes never leaving Jun’s, a small frown forming on his face. Jun thinks it’s an endearing look at him, that confusion sits well with Sho’s features. He finds that he wants to put Sho on the spot like this sometime again in the future just because.  
  
“If I ask you,” he begins slowly, before closing his eyes. This is hard, Jun thinks. In his head he can simply say the words, in his head he can ask without hesitation, but thinking and saying are two very different things and the latter is obviously more difficult than the first, especially after a lot of beer.  
  
But Sho’s nervous too. He feels it with the way Sho’s hands are on his hips, feels the way they’re trembling either from the chilly night breeze or from the fact that Jun still hasn’t finished asking his question.  
  
Jun opens his eyes and looks at Sho without blinking. “If I ask you to leave Praximus with me, will you do it?” and waits for Sho’s answer, slightly terrified of what he might say.  
  
It’s amazing that Sho can say a single word and one can make Jun very happy, while the other can probably break him in many ways imaginable. It’s even more amazing that Sho has this much power on him, that one word that comes out from his lips can make Jun feel a myriad of contrasting things.  
  
“Yes,” he hears Sho say softly, his eyes on Jun’s. “Yes, but only if you ask,” and Jun wants to hit him for being such a smug bastard, but he’s happy, so happy that Sho actually said yes, that he doesn’t.  
  
“All right, I’m asking. Leave this rock with me?” he says, admitting defeat, and Sho doesn’t even wait a beat to answer this time.  
  
“Yes,” Sho tells him and Jun kisses him the moment the word left Sho’s lips like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do, his fingers tangled in Sho’s hair. Sho responds with equal enthusiasm, his hands gripping Jun’s hips tightly, and Jun loses track when one kiss ends and another begins. He doesn’t want to stop kissing Sho because he’s happy, really happy that Sho didn’t even hesitate to run away with him when Jun simply asked him to.  
  
Jun thinks Sho might actually be as invested as him about whatever this is they have and it makes him feel warm and fuzzy inside.  
  
He doesn’t want this to end. He doesn’t want to feel time creeping up on them because the last few weeks have been blissful and Jun never wants them to run out, not with Sho by his side. He wants the days to remain as such till the end comes and he finds that he will be thankful if that’s exactly what happens.


	6. 2237 Part One

Of course it doesn’t happen like that.  
  
Just three days after Christmas, when they’re both in Sho’s apartment and Jun’s asking him to fill up forms to acquire clearance necessary for those wanting to venture out to the Messier 81 colonies, Sho suddenly stays perfectly still, stylus in hand and the pad in the other, a frown on his face.  
  
Jun asks him, “What’s wrong?” and Sho looks up at him in alarm, then he’s saying, “I can’t remember my serial number,” in a small voice, but it’s loud enough for Jun to hear, loud enough for Jun to tell that it’s starting. The memory lapse is so obvious this time that Sho’s starting to forget the essentials regarding his own identity or whatever it is regarding his origins that his maker decided to leave him with. Every replicant comes with a unique, identifying serial number (Jun knows his like the back of his own hand, it’s what makes him him) and to forget something as vital as that is to forget a big portion of themselves altogether.  
  
Just like that, Jun can feel his heart breaking; can probably hear it shatter if he listens close enough. He feels raw and cold all of a sudden, like the temperature regulator in the room suddenly stopped working and his body refused to acclimatize itself to the changes. He thinks gravity in Praximus could have vanished in an instant and he still wouldn’t notice it, still wouldn’t feel a damn thing except the dread that threatens to eat him alive.  
  
It becomes worse as the days pass.  
  
Sho sits in the corner of his apartment where he’s working on the warp improvement for shuttles when Jun sees sparks from the corner of his eye before Sho’s drawing back, and Jun nearly runs to him.  
  
“What happened?” he asks, because he knows more than enough about shuttle work now to know that none of the parts Sho’s working with are supposed to let out sparks like that, unless—  
  
“I was going to snap the blue wire, but—” Sho tries to explain but his voice catches in his throat, his eyes fixed on the device console before him. He clears his throat before trying again. “My hands slipped and I think I snapped something else instead.”  
  
They both know that’s not supposed to happen at all, and it’s worse, much worse than simply dropping a screwdriver because Sho’s been programmed for accurate repairs. He’s been made to fix things without causing any more damage, and yet, yet even he sounds uncertain of what he actually ended up doing. It’s proof enough that when the program begins to slowly deteriorate, it takes Sho with it as well, that Sho’s starting to drop in his functionality day by day all because the program is slowly but surely terminating itself.  
  
One time, Sho’s helping him with the dishes while Jun tells him about how the first established colony in Messier 81 is named after a mythological figure of Terran culture, tells him how humans tend to be unimaginative when it comes to names and continues following myths and other timeless tales of gods and heroes, when he suddenly gets interrupted by the sound of porcelain shattering on the floor. He looks at Sho and sees Sho’s hands hovering, his eyes fixed on the pieces of plate now lying at his feet, then Sho’s crouching down, mumbling a, “Sorry,” while picking up the broken pieces as if it was just a normal thing to happen.  
  
But it’s not a normal thing for them.  
  
Jun crouches down beside him, heart hammering against his chest and he takes Sho’s hands in his own. He cups Sho’s jaw when Sho refuses to meet his eyes, forcing Sho to look at him because Jun needs him to see this, needs him to know that Jun knows what this means and he’s not leaving Sho to it, that he’s not leaving Sho alone.  
  
Jun sees fear in Sho’s eyes and he knows for certain that it’s mirrored on his own, then Sho’s saying, “You know what this means, don’t you?” almost like a whisper, and Jun can only nod because he doesn’t know what else to do. He doesn’t know what else to say not when the truth is upon them and catching up faster than they expected.  
  
It means that time is running out.  
  
He makes love to Sho desperately that night; pressing bruises on Sho’s skin and marking him in places that Jun knows will be difficult to hide. He makes Sho moan his name over and over again and swallows some of those moans for his own.  
  
“Jun,” Sho manages, and he sounds so broken, so wrecked that Jun wishes he can simply kiss the problems away, can assure Sho that it’s going to be fine even when he’s not sure about that himself. He wishes he can do anything, anything to spare Sho, anything to buy him more time.  
  
Jun slicks himself up and settles between Sho’s legs, lining up before pressing the head of his cock in.  
  
Sho wraps his legs around him, pulling him closer, his nails digging in Jun’s back, scratching skin and marking Jun as well. Jun pushes further in, slowly at first, then Sho’s telling him, “Move, move, Jun,” begging in a voice Jun never heard him use before and Jun obliges, fucking into Sho in short but hard thrusts, Sho panting his name in response.  
  
Sho’s heels dig into his lower back as he drives up, then Sho’s meeting him halfway, rolling his hips to meet every thrust Jun makes, the mattress moving with them. Jun wraps a hand around Sho’s cock, pumping him in time with his thrusts and Sho makes a mangled moan, like it’s been forced out on him and suddenly he’s pulling Jun down, down to kiss him and Jun takes his next breath in Sho’s mouth.  
  
But their current angle is not right. It feels good, yes, but for Jun it’s still not quite what he’s looking for so he pulls away from Sho’s lips. Sho’s hands are now grabbing at the sheets at his sides, and Jun puts his hands under Sho’s knees, pushing until he’s almost bending Sho in half and there, just like that the angle is perfect and he tells Sho just how so by letting out a breathy, “Fuck.”  
  
“Yes, yes, yes, _Jun_ —“ Sho groans, the syllable of Jun’s name drawn out and choked out of him at the last second, and with that Jun’s abandoning any pretense of control, fucking into Sho as hard and as fast he can, his hips repeatedly coming into contact with Sho’s ass, his fingers leaving bruises at the back of Sho’s thighs.  
  
“Come,” Jun tells him, pleads him. “Come for me,” and Sho lets out a whine that gets cut short when Jun makes a particularly sharp and hard thrust. Sho’s body arches off the bed despite not having much room to begin with, and then Sho’s coming, spilling hot between them. Sho makes a desperate sob of Jun’s name as he balls the sheets in his fists, then he’s clenching around Jun and Jun fucks him through that even still.  
  
“Jun,” Sho coaxes, his voice hoarse and breathless. Jun clings tightly to the back of Sho’s knees and he continues driving up and taking whatever Sho’s giving him right now, which is everything. Sho’s clenching around him in the most perfect way and Jun can feel his hips stuttering, his thrusts becoming less controlled and more desperate.  
  
“Jun, come on, let go,” Sho asks him, and he sounds sated but still pleading and Jun knows it won’t be long, not with the way Sho feels around him and Sho’s voice sounding in his ears.  
  
“Let go,” Sho asks him one last time, and Jun swears, gasping Sho’s name before finally doing exactly what Sho asks for, pouring himself out inside, his cock twitching as he takes a breath against Sho’s cheek, his arms finally letting go of their vice-like grip on Sho’s legs. Sho tilts his head to kiss him and it’s not sweet and not slow but still fierce and wanting despite everything they had just done.  
  
After, when Jun has cleaned the both of them with a cloth and he has settled beside Sho and taken his place in the bed, he murmurs an apology in Sho’s hair because they never really fucked like that, not in the past at least. Sho waves off the apology by kissing him senseless, half on top of him and just like that Jun can feel that it’s mutual, that Sho’s as desperate as he is.  
  
Because if Jun wasn’t certain before, he’s sure now that Sho is into this as deep as he is, and what he feels Sho probably feels too, perhaps even in multitudes. If he’s scared then Sho’s definitely in the same boat as him, and Jun thinks he can handle being terrified of running out of time as long as he’s not alone, and he thinks that that might just be the same for Sho too.  
  
The following morning, Jun sends Nino a message that he’s retiring, that he’s leaving his work to Nino and he adds an apology and hopes that Nino understands as much as he lets people on nearly ninety-eight percent of the time. His doorbell rings in less than fifteen minutes. When Sho makes a move to open the door, clad only his boxers (how can he still walk, Jun doesn’t know for sure) Jun stops him and tells him that this is his to take because he already knows who’s on the other side and knows who that person is looking for.  
  
“What the fuck,” is the first thing Nino says when Jun opens the door and it’s not even a question, just a direct statement that no, this time Nino doesn’t understand and that Jun has to explain.  
  
He sees Nino’s eyes darting to peer inside his apartment and Jun steps aside to let him in, knowing full well that this isn’t the kind of conversation they can have on his doorstep.  
  
Sho comes out of the room (thankfully in a bathrobe because Jun doesn’t know what to do if Nino sees what he did to Sho’s skin last night) as Nino leans against Jun’s counter, arms crossed over his chest. He’s frowning, which is not a good sign, and he’s darting glances in Sho’s direction and Jun thinks he knows what Nino’s thinking. Jun takes a seat in his couch, waiting for Nino to say anything.  
  
“Please don’t tell me it’s because of Sho,” Nino says eventually, when it became clear that Jun won’t be the one to break the silence and address the topic.  
  
Jun finds he can’t lie to Nino because Nino is his personal lie detector, has been that way ever since. “It is,” Jun tells him, not sure of what else to say.  
  
Suddenly Nino is in Sho’s space, his glare icy. “So what is it now, Sakurai?” Nino asks, smiling but there’s no trace of amusement in it. “You don’t want the complication, is that it? Want to keep the pleasure model for yourself? Stop whatever it is he’s been made to do?”  
  
“It’s not that,” Jun says sharply, and Nino turns to him, turns his anger on Jun instead despite not stepping away from Sho.  
  
“Then what is it? Why the fuck would you suddenly tell me that? What got into you?” Nino asks and he sounds betrayed, like this is the last thing he expected Jun to do and it’s Jun’s fault that Nino thinks that way when he’s always been the workaholic pleasure model Nino has known nearly all his life.  
  
Jun finds he can’t hate Nino despite his lack of understanding. Nino has always been there by his side, hasn’t he? He probably made that keycard duplicate to check on him once in a while, to make sure that he doesn’t overwork himself.  
  
“I’m dying,” Sho answers for Jun, and Nino whips his head sharply to look at Sho, his eyes wide.  
  
For a while not one of them say anything, then Nino takes a deep breath. “Does Aiba know?” he asks softly, and Jun’s not sure if Nino’s talking to him or to Sho but it’s Sho who answers, “No, I haven’t told him yet.”  
  
Nino fixes Sho a look, one that Jun can’t define. “No, let me tell him. I’ll tell him because you, Jun-kun, and I all know what he’ll try to do once he finds out from either one of you,” Nino says, his voice hard as steel, and Jun admires him for that. He wants to thank Nino for taking that burden out of their hands because Nino’s right, as he always is. Aiba will definitely try to find a way to give Sho an extension despite knowing how impossible it is because no replicant ever managed to cheat the four-year lifespan.  
  
It’s the bone-hard medical fact for their kind.  
  
Nino turns to him, eyes sympathetic. “What do you need me to do?” he asks, his anger from earlier now gone and he just sounds resigned, like he doesn’t know what else he can do to help.  
  
Jun wants to tell him, you’re helping enough by just being here, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t because Nino will want to hear nothing of it, because Nino will insist that Jun ought to demand something from him just so he can say that he did something, _anything_.  
  
Jun understands that. He understands it so much because that’s exactly how he feels, that feeling of wanting to do something just to be able to say that at least, you did something and just didn’t sit there and waited for it.  
  
He meets Nino’s eyes and tries to tell him how grateful he is for everything with just a look. He hopes he can convey that much and that Nino can understand it. “I need you to be a friend,” is what he says, because what else can he demand from Nino that Nino hasn’t already given yet? Nothing, not anymore.  
  
Nino looks away, but not before Jun sees tears prickling in his eyes. “You fucking idiot,” he says, and Jun’s not certain if Nino means him or Sho, but he waits. “You think I’d rush for anyone else? You think I’ll demand answers and an explanation why when you just told me the biggest piece of news other pleasure models will die to hear? You think I’ll do that for anyone?”  
  
Sho touches Nino’s arm lightly, in an effort to comfort him maybe, and Nino turns to him. “And you,” he says, voice cracking. “You think I’d do everything I’ve done so far for anyone else but the two of you? Seriously?” and that’s all he’s able to say because Sho’s hugging him, murmuring thank you after thank you, and Jun just lets them. He just sits there and watches how Sho says things for him, letting Sho say what might be his goodbye to Nino.  
  
They don’t know how long Sho’s got left, anyway.  
  
Nino pulls away after a while, blinking furiously and trying to regain his composure. “I’ll tell Aiba-shi,” he says to the both of them, before turning to Jun. “But you make sure you call me, contact me, send a note or whatever when something happens,” he pauses, eyes hard. “You know what I mean,” he says and Jun nods. They don’t need to say it, not when they all know what Nino means by that.  
  
Nino walks back to the door and Jun follows him. He walks Nino out of the apartment and before Nino steps outside, he tells Jun, low enough that Jun is the only one who can hear him, “Don’t leave him.”  
  
Jun just nods, before he’s answering in a soft voice, “I have no intention to,” and that’s apparently good enough for Nino. Nino takes his leave without another word and Jun shuts the door before letting his weight sag against it and finally he’s sinking down to the floor. He feels extremely exhausted all of a sudden.  
  
Sho crouches down beside him, and perhaps the way Jun looks at him is so open, so revealing that Sho can actually see how he feels inside. Perhaps Sho can see how desolate and helpless he feels because Sho’s suddenly saying, “I’m sorry,” over and over again and Jun’s shaking his head over and over again because it’s not Sho’s fault. It’s not Sho’s fault that time is running out that fast, not his fault that the fuse is lit and the bomb will go off anytime soon.  
  
It’s not his fault that Jun feels like dying, like every fiber of his being just refuses to hold itself together, and yet it is. It is Sho’s fault that Jun feels like this because only Sho can make him feel like this and Jun won’t really have that any other way.  
  
That doesn’t mean it doesn’t fucking hurt at all, because it does. It hurts like something is continuously slicing through his chest, like something claws at his heart every time he looks at Sho and every time he remembers that this time might be the last time, that this may be the only time.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Sho murmurs again, and Jun buries his face in Sho’s chest, feeling and hearing Sho’s heart beat as steadily as his own does, Sho’s artificial heat telling him that for now Sho’s here and he’s here and no one’s leaving anyone, not yet at least.  
  
\--  
  
Sho resigns his position as a shipyard engineer, revealing the details only to Ohno who just nods in understanding before asking, “Anything else you need?” to which Sho shakes his head at. Ohno gives Sho a fierce hug and Jun lets them have a moment to themselves before parting ways.  
  
Jun knows that Sho already forwarded the progress of his warp research to Ohno, entrusting the rest of his research to the small human who made so much impression in Sho’s life, who treated Sho like a friend and probably like family, never minding that he is a bioengineered android and never letting something as mundane as that come between them.  
  
Aiba visits them one day, immediately sobbing at the sight of Sho and it took a while to calm him down, not even with Nino around. Jun and Nino give them a moment alone because obviously, Aiba has some things he wants only Sho to know and Jun respects that as much as Nino does. They both know how hard this is for Aiba given his background, and how it hits too close to home, how it hits on Aiba’s personal insecurities.  
  
“How are you?” Nino asks conversationally, and Jun knows he can give any answer to that and it will still be the right answer.  
  
“Alive,” is what he settles for, because it’s the most honest thing he can think of at the moment, and probably in the moments to come. He’s starting to run out of answers, he realizes. No, he’s not yet feeling the signs of imminent deterioration like Sho does, but that doesn’t make it any less real every time he sees it happening to Sho and he’s unable to do anything but just watch as it happens, as it slowly eats Sho away.  
  
It becomes so bad lately that there are a couple of instances when he tries to talk to Sho, but Sho just stares at him blankly for a moment before he’s blinking rapidly and asking Jun to repeat what he just said.  
  
Those are the days Jun hates the most because it’s the most painful reminder that Sho really is wavering on the edges, that he’s starting to wear and it’s only a matter of time for him. It’s the kind of event that reminds Jun that so many things are running out at the same time, and that he cannot, no matter how hard he tries, hold on to them because they’re slipping away too fast even for his computer reflexes.  
  
He feels so helpless on some days that he feels guilty, because the last thing Sho needs is to see how much this is affecting him, but Jun can’t exactly hide how useless it makes him feel because he wants to help Sho, only that he doesn’t know how and that’s the most frustrating thing to ever happen.  
  
He has no idea if he’s voicing these thoughts out loud, but Nino puts a hand on his knee and tells him, “You’re helping him by being there for him,” in a stern, elder brother-like voice, like Jun just did something wrong and needs to be scolded for it.  
  
He knows that Nino is right. He knows that he’s doing the only thing he can do to help, which is to stay by Sho’s side and never leave him as it happens gradually, but that doesn’t make things any easier to accept. That knowledge doesn’t simply assuage his fears and gets rid of all the hopelessness he feels, and he’s certain Nino understands just as much that he doesn’t have to voice it out.  
  
“How did Aiba take it?” he asks, deliberately changing the topic.  
  
Nino is quiet for a while, looking thoughtful. Nino’s probably thinking how to phrase it in such a way that won’t make him feel guilty even if it’s not really his doing, not really, he thinks. Nino’s always been like that. He may appear conceited and condescending at times, but he’s the most perceptive and equally sensitive replicant Jun ever met, and he knows he can attribute that humanity to Aiba.  
  
“Not very well,” Nino tells him, and it’s enough. Jun doesn’t know what else to expect, really. He can only imagine how Aiba looked, probably far worse than he did when he told Jun about his change of conviction that night at the bar. That’s a look he never wants to see in Aiba’s face again because the Aiba he has come to know is a bundle of endless energy, and to see him in another way entirely is something Jun doesn’t want to ever happen again, not under his watch, at least.  
  
But it’s bound to happen when Sho finally… goes.  
  
Jun can’t even say _dies_ , because a part of him is terrified that once he says it, it really becomes inescapable, despite that being the case already. It’s like the old Terran story of the Boogeyman, that the more he says it, the more it becomes real, and Jun, despite knowing that’s not possible, still doesn’t want to take that chance.  
  
“Sho said something about leaving this chunk of rock?” Nino asks him, diverting his attention from his thoughts.  
  
Jun just nods ruefully. “Though I don’t know if we can still do that,” he whispers, the reality of it too hard to ignore.  
  
Nino nudges him with his shoe. “Do it,” he says, eyes hard on Jun. “Do it, Jun-kun, because you might never get another chance. What else do you need? I know someone from stargate embassy, all it takes is one call.” Nino sounds so desperate, so willing to help him and Sho out that it makes Jun smile. He doesn’t deserve this. This kindness from Nino, the generosity he and Aiba are continuously extending to them.  
  
He doesn’t deserve any of it but he still gets them. Jun doesn’t know what star he may have been activated in, but it may very well be a lucky one at that.  
  
“We’re just waiting for final clearance, actually,” he tells Nino, who just sighs and nods, patting Jun’s knee twice. He and Sho already submitted the necessary forms, already filled it up despite Sho’s lapses in personal memory. Sho has an existing employee ID at the shipyard anyway, and all they needed was Ohno’s signature and authorization for them to gain access to Sho’s full records. He and Sho are basically good to go, just waiting for their official documents from the Praximus Stargate.  
  
“Make sure you get yourself there, all right?” Nino says to him after a while. “Don’t let yourself rot away in this colony, not here. Somewhere far from here, somewhere out there, maybe, but not here.”  
  
Jun understands why Nino’s telling him this. Nino’s telling him all these things because it’s a once in a lifetime chance, and seeing as their lifetime is very short and very precise, he may not really get another chance. Jun now shares Sho’s belief that there’s so much to see, so many things out there that Praximus, no matter how evolved it is, still cannot offer.  
  
He wonders if they still have time to go and visit the Regilian satellite that has the revolutionary regolith, to see the orange dust in its natural condition and not just a tiny sample of it that Sho keeps around his neck along with the troostite pendant.  
  
It sounds too far-fetched that it stings just to think about it.  
  
Jun exhales, the sound of his breath too loud for the quiet room. It lingers for a while before he finds himself asking Nino, “How hard do you have to hold on to someone to make them stay, to make them stop slipping away?”  
  
How do you stop someone from dying when it’s the only thing left for them to do?  
  
Nino doesn’t move. He doesn’t even incline his head toward Jun’s direction, and he just continues staring at a pattern in the living room carpet. The silence stretches and Jun thinks Nino won’t answer at all when Nino opens his mouth and says softly, “You don’t.”  
  
Jun frowns at him but before he can ask Nino to clarify, Nino turns to finally look at him and continues, “You don’t hold on to them at all.”  
  
When Jun asks, “What do I do, then?” he’s aware his voice sounds detached, shaky, because he knows that whatever it is he has to do he’s not ready to do it yet and it might take a long time for him to be actually ready for it.  
  
Jun can only hope that it won’t take too long for it to be finally too late.  
  
Nino gives him a sad smile, the kind of smile he only used once, when he, Jun, and Aiba were in this bar and Aiba just told Jun the gravity of the reality surrounding them and Nino could only watch by his side, just like what he’s doing now.  
  
“You let them go, Jun-kun. That’s what you do.”  
  
After some time Aiba and Nino go on their way, Nino hauling Aiba away because the latter still cannot stop crying and if he continues with it, Jun thinks he’ll end up crying too and he doesn’t want Sho to see that, not when Sho already has too much on his plate.  
  
Jun knows he’ll do all he can just to make sure Sho suffers less, and if that includes withholding himself he will do it without hesitation. If that means he has to act like it’s not affecting him even if the reality itself makes him immobile at times, he will act just so because Sho deserves nothing less.  
  
Jun needs be strong for Sho even if he cannot be strong for his own self, and he finds that for Sho, really, he’ll do just about anything.  
  
And he’s sure that a day will come when that will include following what Nino told him, which is to just let Sho go.  
  
\--  
  
Sho left for the shower, and it takes a while before Jun notices that he’s been gone for quite a long time. At first he thought it was just Sho taking his sweet time because instead of the sonics Jun heard water, and Sho only uses water showers when he feels like indulging himself, usually after a tough time at work or after a particularly hard fuck.  
  
But Sho has done neither of that today, and he’s taking too long. Suddenly, Jun’s heart is pounding, he thinks his heart moved to his throat and it’s beginning to choke him, then he’s running and demanding immediate access to the bathroom. He screams at his computer to move it, then the doors swoosh open with a slight hiss and he rushes inside. He doesn’t know what to expect but he fears the worst, he fears that time has finally caught up with them and that it has finally devoured Sho, completely and without second thought.  
  
He finds Sho leaning against the shower tiles, his arms wrapped around himself and looking so vulnerable, and when Jun steps forward, his breath still caught in his throat, Sho turns his head slowly, very slowly to look at him with unfocused eyes. Jun feels like sobbing out of relief because he feared for the worst, that he’ll just find Sho lying there, finally lifeless and unmoving, but at the same time he feels like sobbing because they’re only delaying the inevitable again.  
  
Sho looks at him like he sees nothing, like Jun isn’t even there and that’s when Jun’s knees finally give way. He ends up kneeling beside Sho, the spray of water from the shower hitting Sho before hitting his clothes. Jun’s face is wet from the shower, but he knows it’s not shower water when he feels something warm run down his cheek, the taste of salt lingering on the corner of his lips.  
  
“Sorry,” he says, wiping furiously at his cheek. Sho doesn’t want to see that, does he?  
  
He looks up when he sees in the corner of his eye that Sho’s shaking his head.  
  
“I’m not,” Sho says, meeting his eyes, and finally, he looks like Sho again, looks like the Sho Jun knows and not the shell Jun is becoming acquainted with day by day.  
  
Sho reaches out a hand and his touch is so light, so very light against Jun’s cheek that if Jun closes his eyes he might not feel Sho there at all.  
  
“I’m not sorry,” Sho repeats, and Jun feels like something fragile inside him has shattered and he lost touch with his whole self. He feels numb and desensitized and yet, despite all that, reality comes to stab him at the back when he least expects it.  
  
Is this how it feels to be so broken? Is this how Sho feels all the time, how Sho feels as each day goes by?  
  
He finds himself leaning into Sho’s touch no matter how light and how impermanent it feels. Jun can’t even feel warmth emanating from it and it’s not the water, no, because Sho has the shower in a temperature warm enough to be relaxing, and Jun wonders how is it possible that despite that, despite all the warmth surrounding them Sho still feels nothing like it?  
  
How is it possible that Sho feels as if life itself is getting sapped out of him in waves, leaving him cold almost to the point of total abandonment?  
  
Jun turns his head to plant a kiss to Sho’s palm, to the white of his wrist. Feeling how faint Sho’s pulse is, he hopes desperately that his own warmth is enough for them both. Then he’s meeting Sho’s eyes, sees himself reflected in them and sees how wrecked he looks like, and fuck it, just fuck it because that’s not what Sho needs right now and trust Jun to fuck up even that small thing.  
  
Suddenly, Sho’s shifting and he’s cupping Jun’s jaw hard, a noticeable contrast from earlier, then he’s pulling Jun’s face towards his own for a kiss, one so bruising and hard and desperate. Jun responds to him kindly, giving as much as Sho’s taking and taking just as much Sho gives him. Jun finds himself wishing, not for the first time, that he can kiss the problems away, that a single kiss like this can put an end to it all and they can go back to the way it was before.  
  
Because he can’t watch Sho die. He thought he can but he can’t, he just can’t watch Sho die slowly as Sho’s program rewires itself over and over again to eventual termination. It’s too much. Jun thinks he’ll gladly take Sho’s place or trade some of the days, even the months that he has left in him just so they can meet in the middle and go at the same time then no one has to suffer through the reality of losing someone.  
  
But it doesn’t work that way.  
  
And Jun is starting to think the grief is something concrete, so solid that not even his computer part can suppress it because he is grieving, he’s starting to grieve because Sho has been a ticking time bomb ever since.  
  
Even before he met Jun, apparently.  
  
Sho kisses him like all his life (or what remains of it) depends on it. He kisses Jun fiercely, his teeth nipping at Jun’s bottom lip, his tongue soothing whatever sting Jun felt when Sho bites from time to time.  
  
He kisses Jun with such searing intent as if he wants to chase out the grief and all the hurt Jun’s feeling.  
  
Jun surrenders, because what else can he do? What else is there left for him to do other than surrender himself wholly, to give everything, anything he has left to give? He doesn’t know which words to say. He doesn’t think he can say anything that will make it all right, because it’s not going to work because it’s not all right. It’s not going to be all right, not when Sho’s the one slipping from his grasp and he has no idea where and how to hold on just to make him stay, even for a while longer, even for just one more second.  
  
Sho undresses him like time is running out, because it is. Jun helps him with it because he needs to feel Sho, needs to feel the hard line of Sho’s body against his own, needs to remember again how Sho’s touch feels against his skin, how his fingertips leave trails of gooseflesh every now and then. Jun needs to feel that Sho’s real, that Sho’s here right now, that he’s not going anywhere and no one’s taking him away, not just yet.  
  
Jun holds on to him, holds on to Sho’s shoulders and he knows that yes, this is the spot that his fingers always go to when he needs support. This is the special place on Sho’s body that he often clings to when Sho’s giving and taking at the same time and while it’s too much, too much for Jun to take and to accept, he still does because it’s Sho, it’s _Sho_.  
  
He waits for what seems like eternity, then Sho’s inside him, sheathed deeply, and the burn is so real, so physical and definite that Jun bites his lip and clings. He simply clings to Sho like tooth and nail because this is what he needs. He needs to feel this, this kind of pain, because it’s still better than everything he feels inside, still less excruciating than what he feels all the time.  
  
“Move,” he begs Sho, “please move.” I need to feel you, he doesn’t say, or maybe he does, because Sho’s looking at him with eyes unguarded and bare, so bare that Jun can see how much Sho needs this as well. He sees in Sho’s eyes how much Sho needs him in order to remember, in order to feel, and now Jun knows that they’re completely the same in that aspect. The sight of Sho like this is killing him, and he leans forward to kiss Sho because he can’t do anything else.  
  
“Please,” he begs one last time, and Sho begins to move, slowly at first, the pace maddening and not enough, but Jun knows why he does that. He wants to prolong this moment as much as Jun does, wants to keep it for himself and for Jun and wants it to become something they can look back to, something they will never forget.  
  
But it’s not enough. It’s not what Jun truly needs right now so he grinds himself down, and that’s when Sho picks up the pace, changing the angle and it’s right, it’s just right and just perfect and Jun’s saying Sho’s name over and over like it’s being ripped out of him, telling Sho that yes, right there, just like that, no, no, don’t stop. His nails dig into Sho’s shoulders and he’s panting, Sho’s name along with a blur of words that sound like encouragement. His eyes shut tight when Sho makes a sharp thrust because he wants to feel everything. When Jun inhales, he catches the scent of Sho around him, feels Sho’s warm and wet hands clinging to him desperately, and he arches, a hitched moan caught in his throat.  
  
Jun writhes above Sho because Sho obviously remembers how to move, how to make him feel it and how to hit that spot again and again, making Jun dissolve and give up coherency, making Jun forget the harsh reality that’s upon them as if there’s nothing else but Sho and the way Sho feels inside, the way he moves inside Jun.  
  
Jun’s definitely ahead of Sho this time. He can feel the way the insides of his thighs tingle, making his toes curl. He knows that he’s so close that if Sho touches him, just a brush of fingers and he’ll be gone, he’ll go right ahead. But from the way Sho’s holding on to him and gasping his name, Jun also knows Sho’s just close behind, and maybe he’s really not leaving Sho, just like what he always does and what he chose to do more than two months ago.  
  
The spray of shower water is only making Jun’s skin feel more heated, and like this, with him on top of Sho and Sho under him, his hands on Sho’s shoulders and Sho’s on his thighs, just like this Jun can feel his own warmth mingling with Sho’s own, and it’s enough to tell him that this is real because it feels real and Sho feels real enough.  
  
Sho wraps a hand around him and that’s it, Jun is suddenly swept up by his release that he’s gripping Sho’s shoulders tight, nails digging to the flesh and fingertips most likely leaving bruises, his body drawn tight. He’s hissing through his teeth to prevent himself from screaming out loud because it’s so good, it feels so good to let go.  
  
Jun thinks he blacks out after that because all he can feel is how tired and how spent he is, his thighs shaking and there’s no strength left in him to even remain upright. His body falls forward and he slumps against Sho, breathing hard against Sho's neck. He thinks Sho pulls out not long after he's gone, thinks that Sho reaches blindly behind them to grab something to clean them up.  
  
He’s not sure because the exhaustion is bone-deep, seeping through every metal and every circuit in his body, and that’s when Jun realizes that _it’s starting_.  
  
It’s starting for him because he’s built to endure rounds and rounds of sex, his refractory period not even an hour long, almost nonexistent when he’s in top shape. And yet, yet for the first time he feels tired, like he just spent the entirety of his energy because his power source is not sufficient in its performance, and he feels thankful because finally, he’s feeling the first signs of wearing away.  
  
Finally, he’s feeling how it is to fade.  
  
He laughs softly because he’s feeling so overwhelmed and grateful, because he has waited for this. A few months ago he might have dreaded it, but lately he finds himself wishing he knows how it feels to be dying just so he can say to Sho’s face that, “yes, I understand,” and mean it wholeheartedly. He laughs because he can say that now and not feel like he swallowed ash afterwards. He laughs because finally, finally he can say that he knows now that this is how it feels to die.  
  
Sho looks at him, eyes tired but full of wonder, then he’s asking, “What’s wrong?” because Jun is laughing to himself despite the idea not being worth laughing about.  
  
Jun takes Sho’s hand in his, their fingers entwined and he squeezes. He knows he’s not lying, not anymore when he tells Sho, “I’m with you.”  
  
I’m with you now.  
  
\--  
  
Sho’s functionality begins to drop at a faster rate than the one they’re both getting used to.  
  
There are times when Sho simply stares off into the distance with eyes unfocused and no amount of calling his name will make him snap out of it. It gets so bad sometimes that Jun has to shake him out of it, and sometimes, the bad becomes worse because not even the shaking works no matter how hard Jun does it.  
  
Sho’s appetite has significantly decreased no matter what Jun makes for him. It takes more than coaxing to convince him to eat anything, and sometimes it drives Jun so desperate he thinks he’s begging Sho, but most of those times Sho’s just looking at one spot on the wall and he’s seeing nothing and not even hearing Jun’s voice, his breathing so faint that Jun has to strain his ears in order to hear it.  
  
And when Sho finally snaps out of it, his eyes will desperately seek Jun’s and there’s nothing there but fear and alarm and Jun knows the very same are mirrored on his own, and it takes all of his strength not to break and fall to his knees right then and there, right before Sho’s eyes.  
  
Jun hates those because he never feels more useless, more inadequate and incapable of helping Sho whenever those happen. He hates them because he can see how they’re taking Sho apart piece by piece and he can’t even reach Sho to drag him back, to tell him that you’re still here, I’m still here, we’re still here, don’t go yet.  
  
Sho’s hands begin to shake involuntarily, then it sometimes escalates to a full body tremor that all Jun can do is to hold him, wrap his arms around Sho’s form and whisper assurances in his ear as they both wait for the trembling to stop. Sometimes, it works. It takes a while but then Sho stops shaking and he’s regaining composure like the loss of it never happened at all, and in those times Jun lets go of him almost as soon as it stops because Sho doesn’t like feeling helpless and Jun knows that because he doesn’t like that feeling too.  
  
Most of the time, it doesn’t work. Most of the time, the shuddering escalates to the rest of Sho’s body, then he’s seizing up and looking at Jun in combined fright and panic because is this how it is going to be? Sho’s going to tremble like a leaf then what, he’s just going to fall off the edge without any sort of warning? Jun finds himself clinging to Sho as hard as he can in those times, hoping his own body is enough to tell Sho that he’s here, that if he’s going then Jun’s going too, just a little bit later perhaps but he’s going as well and that’s the important thing, isn’t it?  
  
“Jun,” Sho says as he trembles, his voice shaking as much as his entire body does, and Jun clings to him, his arms wrapping around Sho’s quaking form in hopes to help Sho calm down even if they both know how futile it is.  
  
“Jun,” Sho repeats, and this time Jun looks at him. He has to bite his lip because he can’t help the tears prickling in the corner of his eyes.  
  
“I’m here,” he tells Sho. Sho has to know. He needs Sho to know. “I’m here, I’m right here.” One of his hands move to grasp Sho’s face, and despite the tremors, despite the desperation and fear in Sho’s eyes, Sho still manages a weak but reassuring smile. He still smiles at Jun and with that Jun can no longer stop himself from crying.  
  
“I’m right here,” Jun repeats as the tremors only seem to escalate, and he resolves to cling to Sho as hard as he can. He holds on to Sho for as long as the shaking lasts and for as long as time allows him to because every second of every moment counts.  
  
Then one day, the seizures just stop.  
  
They stopped like they never happened at all. They just stopped coming like what they always did almost every night, sometimes in the morning, and that’s the day Sho tells Jun, for the first time since Christmas, that he’s feeling perfectly fine and nothing feels out of place.  
  
Nothing feels wrong, Sho tells him.  
  
They’re in the shipyard that day, as he and Sho finalize their documents and registration as part of the colonists leaving for Messier 81, some ten million light years away from Praximus itself. They tell them that the space travel will take three weeks and that the last series of shuttles departing for the distant galaxy are leaving sometime in the next two months. They give Jun and Sho a roster of shuttles they can board, and Sho leaves the decision to Jun, saying something about finding Ohno to properly say goodbye.  
  
“Go, then,” Jun says, waving Sho off without looking. After a while he hears a couple of gasps somewhere near him but he ignores it. There’s already a respectable amount of distance between him and Sho when he realizes that he needs Sho’s signature and thumbprint for this as well, so he turns, Sho’s name on his lips to get his attention and that’s when he sees it.  
  
He thinks Praximus or time itself must have stopped moving, the shipyard itself falling into a deathly, eerie sort of silence, the air becoming too still because he can’t hear anything, he can’t see anyone moving, can’t see anyone but Sho who’s sprawled on the ground and unmoving, his eyes glossy and unfocused, a ghost of surprise etched on his face.  
  
No, his mind tells him. No, that can’t be right. No.  
  
He thinks that fire could have rained on the entire colony and he won’t even notice that it did, he won’t even feel a thing because all he feels is his legs burning, then he’s running, running to where Sho is. He doesn’t know if he waves people off to give him space, to give them space, because all he feels is something crushing inside him, crushing and suffocating him and he cannot breathe. Jun cannot feel himself breathing nor hear his own heart pounding. All he feels is the rapid loss of warmth on Sho’s skin as he cradles Sho to his own body, running his hands on Sho’s face and he thinks maybe he’s saying Sho’s name over and over again followed by a litany of _nonononopleasegodpleasenoshono_ , but he isn’t sure, he can’t tell for sure because he doesn’t know if this is all real, if this is all happening.  
  
And no matter how hard Jun tries, no matter how hard he tries to hold on to Sho, no matter how hard or how loud he says Sho’s name, Sho remains there, head pillowed on Jun’s arms and he’s looking at Jun but he’s seeing nothing. Sho is feeling nothing, because while Jun is still holding on Sho’s finally letting go and Jun cannot follow him, not yet at least, because it’s not yet his time and Sho has to go first, has to go right ahead of him just like what they both expected.  
  
Jun thinks he may have screamed, Sho’s name or something else that can perfectly describe the agony he feels, the way his heart clenches despite the fact that it already seemed like it stopped beating altogether, the way he feels his body racking up in sobs like someone tears it through him, cuts it through the metal, through every circuit, through the artificial lines of flesh before leaving him vulnerable and breakable, so breakable that it’ll only take one push and he’s gone.  
  
He thinks his heart starts to give out, like things are falling apart and still, still despite all of that, Jun’s shaking Sho, begging him with tears in his eyes to say something, anything, to look at Jun and see that Jun is here, Jun’s right here with him so all he needs to do is to stand up and everything will be all right again.  
  
He thinks Ohno may have arrived at one point. Jun thinks it’s Ohno who tries to pull him away, to pull his arms away, but Jun doesn’t know for sure because he can’t see anything else, can’t hear anything else but the small voice that probably belongs to him, saying Sho’s name over and over and begging him to just please, please don’t.  
  
Please, _not yet_.  
  
He chokes at the searing agony, the way his heart feels like it’s fighting for every beat, the spike of his heart rate too faint and yet too choking at the same time. It aches, it hurts so much that Jun doesn’t know how to make it stop, how to make it just stop and cease beating, cease giving life to him just so he can’t feel this. He doesn’t want to feel anything anymore especially the way Sho’s slipping from his grasp despite the entirety of his weight in Jun’s arms, his artificial warmth leaving his body cold.  
  
Jun’s heart is hammering but he can’t feel it, the only thing he can sense and know to be true is the way that Sho’s body lies unmoving and unresponsive, leaving Jun with nothing but an unspoken litany of no not yet Sho please don’t go yet please we were supposed to go together we were going to leave right now we’re just finalizing aren’t we stay with me snap out of it Sho look at me get up look at me look at me stay with me Sho please don’t please come back I’m here I’m right here please wake up I was supposed to go first wasn’t I I was the one with the deadline please wake up get up please stay please  
  
But Sho can’t hear him, can’t see him and can’t feel him, Sho’s body is nothing but a dead weight on his arms and he doesn’t know anything anymore, he can’t feel and he can’t see and he can’t hear anything else aside from his own voice and how detached it sounds like.  
  
He thinks he begs Sho one last time before he can’t remember anything anymore aside from the way that Sho’s program is finally, finally shutting itself down for good.  
  
\--  
  
It turns out that Sakurai Sho’s incept date was year 2233, January 25th.


	7. 2237 Part Two

Jun doesn’t remember most of it.  
  
He thinks his program did it to save him, the way it chose to be selective and erase the most painful parts of it happening, but what his program can do to his head it apparently cannot do for anything else because Jun clearly remembers how the pain feels, how jagged and sharp the ends of it are and how they grind against every inch of his being and leave stinging wounds every time.  
  
He remembers that his last words to Sho were, “Go, then,” with a wave of his hand, not realizing the gravity of those words and how real they came to be in a matter of seconds. He remembers that Sho’s last words to him were, “You handle it, you take care of it, I’m leaving it all to you,” and he wonders, did Sho know that his time was up, right then and there? Before he made up some excuse to find Ohno, probably hoping to spare Jun from seeing it happening, only that it came so sudden and so unexpected that in the end Jun was still the first one there, the first to see it?  
  
He feels so hollow, like his existence is nothing but a gray space and there’s nothing to see, nothing to hear or to touch or to feel. Just nothing, and in the silence of that nothingness he feels emptiness, like he has nothing more to offer because he doesn’t know what else he has left, assuming he has anything left at all.  
  
He’s the one who clears Sho’s apartment out, Ohno helping him with it. Ohno says nothing when Jun lingers, and he respectfully looks away when Jun lifts the sheets up to his nose to smell, anything to remember how Sho’s scent was like, but just like what he feels inside there’s nothing, not even a trace of Sho. Jun rolls the sheets in a ball out of frustration, throwing them to the side and knocking over Sho’s bedside table, a small screwdriver dropping to the ground.  
  
And that does it. The sight of something so simple, something so insignificant dropping to the ground in a dull thud is what makes Jun remember it all over again, and maybe he’s crying, sobs loud enough for Ohno to hear because the next thing he feels is Ohno’s arms around him, and Jun thinks he clings to Ohno because Ohno’s real, Ohno is exactly what Jun doesn’t feel, what he doesn’t feel anymore. Ohno’s right there and Jun maybe, at one point, says Sho’s name because suddenly Ohno’s crying with him.  
  
Jun can feel it in the way Ohno’s shaking. Not as much as he shakes, no, but enough to tell Jun that he’s breaking too, perhaps because of the way Sho just slipped from their grasp without any sort of warning, or maybe it’s because of the way Jun reminds Ohno of what they both lost.  
  
He can’t do this. He thought he can go to Sho’s place and just clear it out and do it the normal way but he can’t, he can’t because everything reminds him of Sho and it’s too much to take that he can’t breathe, that he has to fight for his next breath just to be able grab one item nearby and toss it inside a box.  
  
Jun feels like he’s here to collect pieces of Sho and he finds that he can’t do it. He can’t do it when he feels as if he’s breaking and it’s parts of him he’s leaving scattered on the ground as he tries to go from one item to the next. Everything in this place reminds him of Sho and it’s suffocating, it’s crushing him and making him feel so bare, so lost, and so alone. He feels too much of everything at the moment and Jun just wants for all of it to stop, for him to cease feeling anything at all.  
  
He thinks Ohno must have held him until he calmed down, until they’ve both calmed down. Ohno suddenly apologizes, saying that he’s of no help after all, that he can’t even give Jun the comfort he needs. Jun shakes his head because no, Ohno has helped him more than enough by showing him that he’s not the only one cracking to a million pieces, that he’s not as alone as he thinks he is in this despite feeling exactly so.  
  
He thinks Sho may have something to do with that, the way he left Jun in the hands of the people he trusts, and probably, hopes that Jun will find it in him to trust them as well because they’re here, they’re here even if Sho isn’t, even if Sho’s already gone.  
  
Sometime later they managed to put Sho’s belongings in boxes and Jun arranged for them to be delivered to his place, knowing that while he’ll never open them he can’t bear the idea of destroying them because it will feel like he’s destroying Sho too, destroying what remains of Sho and every last memory he has of him. Jun doesn’t want that because he doesn’t want to forget Sho, not even if all the memory brings him is pain so tangible he becomes incapable of feeling anything else.  
  
Nino finds him like that, sitting in the corner of his own apartment. How he got in Jun doesn’t know, but then again he doesn’t remember enabling security so maybe that’s how. He remembers that Nino gave his keycard duplicate of Jun’s place to Sho and he thinks that it’s there, somewhere in the boxes he’s leaning against, and the idea that every single thing that reminds him of Sho is basically what supports his back right now is too much that he feels the corners of his eyes sting.  
  
He feels like he’s stepping on fragile glass and it shakes and forms a new crack every time he takes another step, and one wrong move can mean life or death for him.  
  
He waits for Nino to say anything, anything that will make Jun desensitized because he wants to detach himself from all of this, from everything that threatens to take over him and swallow him whole. He waits for Nino’s snark, his trademark grin that annoys Jun so much, and he knows that deep inside him he’s wishing Nino will say something that will make Jun’s attention divert to him, something that will make Jun angry because he thinks he doesn’t know how anger feels like, not anymore.  
  
“Aiba’s on his way,” Nino says, in a voice so detached and so hollow that Jun laughs. He laughs without mirth because Nino sounds exactly the same as how he feels inside.  
  
Nino sounds like everything Jun wants to cease feeling.  
  
He laughs because he doesn’t want to cry anymore. He laughs because he can’t remember how to be angry and how to be happy, and thinks to himself, foolishly, that maybe if he continues laughing maybe he’ll remember a little, just a little and maybe it’ll be enough.  
  
Nino doesn’t move any closer to him. He just remains there by Jun’s door, looking at everything else but Jun himself, and Jun wonders, how can he still stand? How can Nino’s legs still move and hold their ground while Jun can’t even breathe and stand at the same time? How is it that Nino still looks like someone stable while Jun can’t even remember what being stable feels like?  
  
He clenches his fist and feels two things dig into his palm. Ohno handed it to him before they parted ways, just after they finished clearing Sho’s things. He gave it to Jun without another word. Jun’s thankful that he’s not the one who gets to pick them up because he doesn’t know what he could have done had that been the case.  
  
He feels the jagged ends of the troostite pendant leave indentations on his skin, a fine contrast to the smoothness of the small vial containing orange sand that supposedly sustains all kinds of life. He wonders, vaguely, if this miraculous dirt from Regulus can bring someone back provided he gets enough of it.  
  
But how do you bring back someone who isn’t alive in the first place? How do you bring back someone who, from the beginning of his time, lived only on borrowed time and only for as long as the machines inside him allowed it?  
  
Not even the advancements of science can bring back someone like that because no replicant has ever been able to get an extension, no replicant has been able to find a way to cheat that. Sho’s no exception to that rule no matter how important he is in Jun’s life because Jun’s running out of time too, only that he no longer feels exactly how much, can no longer tell for sure because a part of him has died along with Sho, the part in him that Sho claimed for his own when Jun wasn’t even looking.  
  
Jun doesn’t know when Aiba arrived, not exactly. He’s so out of touch that he only notices things when they’re right in his face. He only notices Aiba’s presence in his place when he sees that there’s someone else standing beside Nino, and it takes a while, more than a beat for him to realize who it truly is because a part of him has gotten so used to the idea of having Sho around that he’s starting to think it’s always him that’s there even if he’s already gone.  
  
When he meets Aiba’s eyes he sees that they’re brimming with tears, and Jun wants to apologize, to say that he’s sorry because he looks like this, because Aiba gets to see him like this and it’s probably an awful reminder of how real everything is right now. He wants to tell Aiba that he didn’t mean for this to happen, didn’t intend to look like this because he didn’t expect it’ll be this bad, this awful, but he can’t say anything because he can’t apologize for something he has no control over.  
  
He has no idea when Aiba steps closer to him, he thinks he may have spaced out for a moment because suddenly Aiba’s beside him, crouching down with eyes glistening, and Jun, even if the sight breaks him, doesn’t look away because he owes Aiba this much when he can’t apologize for anything. In his periphery, he sees Aiba pull something out from his pocket and he almost screams, almost howls and curls himself in a ball when he sees what it is, only that he doesn’t think he has any voice and any strength left to do so and that’s the only thing that prevented it all from happening.  
  
Aiba’s holding out a small, thin blue chip, its polymer pattern so distinct against the human’s skin. Jun closes his eyes, unable to look at it because he has a feeling he knows what it is, has a feeling why Aiba’s giving it to him.  
  
It was Aiba who took Sho away after it happened. Jun doesn’t know the exact details, but he knows that Sho’s body is somewhere safe, in someplace where he asked Aiba to take him during Aiba and Nino’s last visit. It was what Sho talked to Aiba about, apparently. Jun can only guess because he doesn’t have any strength left to ask.  
  
Aiba doesn’t sound like himself when he speaks. “Sho—“ he chokes at the name and Jun feels like he’s breaking again, like someone dropped him and he’s in a billion pieces of who he once was. Aiba swallows the lump in his throat before continuing, “He told me to give this to you when it happens,” and Aiba sounds so different. He sounds so far from the excited human whose grammar needs more work and can’t even do something as simple as winking, and Jun’s heart breaks for him because he’s not supposed to be like this.  
  
Aiba takes one of his hands, the one that isn’t clinging tightly to Sho’s necklace and vial of dirt, and puts the chip in it before closing his palm and taking Jun’s hand in his own.  
  
“He wanted you to have his memory,” Nino says, and Jun forgot that he’s there as well. But Nino is, because Nino’s the one telling him what’s it for, what is it that Sho left him with. Jun wonders, somewhere inside him that’s still capable of wondering, how Nino knew but he thinks Aiba must have told him because Aiba tells Nino everything, Aiba trusts Nino with everything.  
  
Even with the most painful parts, clearly.  
  
Nino is not looking at him when he continues, “He said you ought to have it because it’s all you anyway,” and Jun wants to sob, to scream and let out everything he feels because he can’t contain all of it anymore. It hurts to know this, all of this. To know that as Sho deteriorated and forgot bits of himself he still did not forget about Jun, about everything they did and the time they spent together no matter how short their time together was. Nino doesn’t have to say that because Jun understands, he knows already and he doesn’t know if he wants to hate Sho for taking such measures behind his back or to thank Sho for all of it.  
  
He settles for repeatedly thumping his head back to the stacks of boxes he’s leaning against, hoping that the momentary pain against his skull is something he can focus on instead. He looks at Aiba and he feels that he doesn’t want to cry anymore, doesn’t have anything left to shed because he already let out so much that he loses track of when he breaks and when he recovers only to break again afterwards. It’s a cycle with him. He finds that grief is so lucid, so physical that it’s a challenge to stay upright, to stay awake, to keep on going.  
  
His hand clenches at the memory chip. It’s all he has left of Sho now, a tangible proof that right now Sakurai Sho is nothing more than a memory for Jun, for Nino, for Aiba, and for the man he affectionately called Satoshi-kun.  
  
Sho is nothing but a remnant of what once was and the chip in his hand is a reminder of that, and yet the same chip is all about him despite being Sho’s and that’s when Jun realizes that his cheeks are wet, that there are new tears streaming down his face and he has no idea when that happened, not when he thought himself incapable of shedding anything anymore only to be proven wrong once more.  
  
Times like this Jun wonders how it will feel like to die, to finally die, and if it’s far from what he’s feeling right now or close enough. He thinks it’s the latter, the way it tries to eat him whole and sap all of the strength he has left until he’s nothing but ashes and dust of who he once was, of who he was before. He thinks it’s a sickness that seeps through every corner of every cell and chip he has in his body, in every circuit and in every code until he’s nothing left and inside him is an emptiness that stretches as far as his eyes can see.  
  
He doesn’t know what happens after that, doesn’t remember clearly to be able to recount it in the future maybe, but he remembers that his heart, while feeling like it’s going to give out still doesn’t, not yet at least despite his chest tightening and making him gasp, making him believe that this is his limit, that this is it for him.

\--

One would probably think that the things that remind Jun of Sho the most are the things that clearly belonged to Sho or had something to do with him: the polymer memory chip, the small, aluminum chip he gave Jun the first time they met at the shipyard, the red necklace Jun bought for him in Starlight Kiss, the vial of orange dirt from a distant Regilian satellite, the willemite necklace he gave Jun for Christmas.  
  
It’s far from all of that.  
  
Sure, those things remind him of Sho. Even the screwdriver that he buried underneath a box that also contains the rest of Sho’s belongings reminds him of Sho after all. Even the yoga mat that he still has folded in the corner does, even his search history in his pad that has a piano does, inevitably. But they only remind Jun in the sense that Sho used to be here, used to be here and there and almost everywhere, and it’s funny because you only realize the depth of someone’s presence in your life when they’re finally gone, when they’re finally out of it.  
  
What reminds him that Sho is now someone who once was, which is the most painful reminder there is, are the simplest, most insignificant and almost unnoticeable things like the temperature of water when Jun bathes himself, or the feel of the sheets against his skin when he lies down on the bed, or the negligible temperature drop in Praximus when nighttime falls.  
  
It becomes worse when Jun goes to places or when he sees the places that he and Sho spent time together once and sees for himself that these places didn’t change at all—the members-only bar still has the same replicant guarding its entrance, the shipyard still functions as a spacedock for incoming and departing shuttlecrafts, the Praximus night market is still selling eighty thousand credits-worth of shellfish rip-off, Starlight Kiss still has stocks of precious mineral accessories from over the galaxy—that’s when he feels that it really happened, that he’s here but Sho isn’t anymore.  
  
Still, that doesn’t stop him from looking around sometimes, peering through the faces of people and replicants alike just to see if maybe, _maybe_.  
  
Maybe if he looks hard enough he will find Sho somewhere there, asking for a mojito and saying Jun will have the same, telling him about Pectens and Haustrums and about priceless minerals, telling him that the stars out there aren’t only for looking, they’re for exploring too and who knows what kind of life is waiting out there, what kind of exciting opportunity?  
  
Sometimes Jun thinks he sees Sho, feels his presence with him when he’s busy wallowing in so much sorrow, as if he’s just in front of Jun and saying, “My Jun isn’t as fragile as this.”  
  
Then he finds himself whispering to nothing but air, “Maybe I’m not that Jun anymore,” because that’s how he feels. He no longer feels like himself, has stopped feeling that way even before Sho died because he’s flaking around the edges already, the signs of deterioration making their presence known in his system.  
  
Maybe I’m no longer that Jun, he thinks, but I’m yours all the same, and it hurts. It hurts all over again like someone pressed a piece of scorching metal against his skin and all he can do is cry out and beg for it to stop, beg it to just get it over and done with because he can’t bear it anymore.  
  
He sinks so low and so deep sometimes that he finds himself talking to his head, talking to Sho there as if Sho’s just inside his head and he’s answering Jun in the way Jun expects him to, and when Jun blinks, he realizes that he isn’t talking to anyone but himself because Sho’s gone, Sho’s _dead_. Sho is not coming back not even if Jun repeats his voice in his head over and over again, not even if Jun comes up with the kinds of replies Sho always gave him because not even his wildest imaginations can bring back Sho and that’s the only thing he knows to be true right now.  
  
That still doesn’t stop him from whispering, “Sho,” from time to time and from sitting there, waiting for the longest time in the darkness of his own apartment and a part of him wants to keep waiting because that part strongly believes if he waits long enough, he’ll definitely hear Sho’s voice saying his name back.  
  
Instead there’s the stretching, deafening silence he’s forced to become acquainted with and  
  
Lub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers Sho and the first time they met in a members-only bar in a booth reserved under Ninomiya’s name.  
  
Dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers how Sho first reacted when Jun deliberately brushed their fingers together as they both bent over a busted flight circuit, Sho instructing and Jun holding a tritanium coiling.  
  
Lub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers the way Sho put him on the spot when he gave Sho the troostite necklace as a memento for that night.  
  
Dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers the way Sho poured his dedication over the different languages Jun taught him, including the one Nino claimed to be lifesaver that in reality might not be a true language at all.  
  
Lub dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers Sho’s inability to control his muscles and his joints and how he made Jun giggle out loud, and the way Sho still exerted an effort despite all that.  
  
Lub dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers the night market, the first time Sho touched him with only a finger and called him by his name.  
  
Lub dub lub dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers the first time he kissed Sho and how enthusiastically Sho responded to him, Sho’s face when Jun finally found out how much he truly adored the necklace and how the rest of that night went.  
  
Lub dub lub dub.  
  
Jun can hear his heart beating and he remembers Aiba’s birthday, the way Sho crept up to him as he whipped out a pasta dish and Sho’s face when he saw the vial of regolith, Sho awkwardly ending his explanation of his gift for Jun because he suddenly felt shy, Sho’s voice when he said yes he’d go with Jun anywhere, Sho’s hitching moan when Jun kissed him that night because Jun was so, so, so very happy.  
  
Lub dub lub dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers how Sho looked like when he couldn’t remember his serial number.  
  
Lub dub lub dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers how Sho’s face looked like when there were pieces of shattered porcelain near their feet, how Sho gasped his name in the darkness when Jun kissed him, pressed bruises into Sho’s skin and marked Sho in different places in his combined desperation and fear.  
  
Lub dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers how Sho repeatedly said he was sorry as Jun sagged most of his weight against his apartment door before he finally sunk to the floor in his exhaustion.  
  
Lub dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers how lost Sho looked as he sat in the shower with his arms wrapped around himself, his breathing muted and his eyes unfocused, his touch fleeting and cold and practically impermanent.  
  
Dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers the tremors, the shuddering that he couldn’t help Sho with, his arms just holding Sho and his mouth saying all kinds of assurances he knew to be false, the way those words never worked and never would have worked but Jun still tried because he couldn’t do anything else.  
  
Lub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers Sho’s face when Sho said he felt fine and nothing felt out of place so it’s time, they should go to the shipyard and finalize things.  
  
Dub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he remembers turning around and seeing no one else but Sho and Sho was not responding to any form of coaxing nor any form of calling his name, the way he simply lay there unmoving and unseeing, his artificial heat leaving his body rapidly and yet Jun still clung to him even if there was no more of Sho left to hold on to.  
  
Lub.  
  
Jun cannot hear his heart beating and he cannot remember anything else anymore.  
  
He takes a deep breath and that’s when he realizes that he never had any meaningful final moments with Sho. Never had the chance to tell Sho how thankful he is that Sho showed him that this is how you live, this is what living is and living means making the most of what you’ve got. He never had the chance to tell Sho that he’s thankful because he can never repay him for this, for all of this. He never even got to tell Sho that he doesn’t regret ever meeting him.  
  
To make things worse, Jun never really had the chance to say goodbye.  
  
But despite that, despite the fact that Jun may be hurting, that he may be breaking in places he never thought possible, he knows he’s never going to regret the time he spent with Sho because he chose that. He chose to be there when the end came, and given the same circumstances with the same choices laid out before him, he knows he’ll pick the same decision over and over again even if it will make him feel this devastated afterwards.  
  
He knows he’ll never turn his back on that decision. Jun may be cracking, literally and figuratively, but he’ll choose the same fate over and over again given the chance. He’ll never trade it for anything, the last two months (and eleven days, his computer part that never sleeps tells him) with Sho, not even for an extension even if someone offers it to him miraculously.  
  
That thought is what makes him go on sometimes. Sometimes it’s enough that he holds on to that, that idea that in Sho’s last two months he spent them with Jun without any regret and he seemed happy about that as much as Jun was happy and content about it. He has Sho’s memory chip to prove it. Sometimes, it’s Jun’s own nature of grabbing the opportunity once it arises and presents itself that makes him move forward, regardless how each step feels weak and unstable because at least he’s moving, at least he’s not stuck in one place.  
  
Sho wouldn’t want that for him, would he? Not that Sho, who, as Ohno said, was so enamored with the idea of life itself. Sho wouldn’t want to see him like this, probably why he was so against getting involved with Jun in the first place. Jun wonders if Sho knew that this would happen eventually.  
  
Maybe he did. And maybe because Sho was really an unfair bastard he never told Jun about it, holding out on Jun again. It won’t be the first time he did that anyway.  
  
But maybe it’s the possibility that Sho hoped for another outcome like Jun no matter how slim the chances of it happening are. Jun can’t blame him for that, not when he also hoped more than once for the same thing to happen despite knowing full well that it wouldn’t be that way, not when Sho was rapidly deteriorating right in front of his eyes.  
  
And yet despite that imminent termination, Sho was there, wasn’t he? He was still the same replicant who immediately said yes when Jun asked him to go somewhere and see another galaxy, to help out in establishing life in someplace else. The same Sho who told him that he wasn’t sorry, which at that time Jun didn’t understand the full meaning of but now he knows that Sho wasn’t sorry that he met Jun, that he went to that bar on Nino’s prompting and possible threatening. Jun knows because he himself isn’t sorry that it all happened.  
  
He’s so sure of so many things that he knows, somewhere inside him, that if Sho was here right now with him, he would tell Jun to get a move on because the entire universe is waiting and Jun only has a bit of time left to see so many things, many of which are just waiting out there for him.  
  
But Jun is also unsure of many things, like if he’s still here in Praximus and whether he’s still functioning or not. He’s unsure of every morning he wakes up on his side of the bed and the first thing that comes to his mind is that Sho woke up earlier than him, only for him to remember almost immediately with harsh, sinking clarity that no, that’s not the case anymore because Sho’s gone and Jun slept on this bed all alone just like he did the night before.  
  
On most days he’s not even sure how he managed to sleep at all.  
  
He’s so unsure whether everything is still worth it, if everything is an open opportunity for anyone who wishes to take it because if that’s the case then why does it feel otherwise?  
  
Why does it feel like nothing is waiting for him and he’s also waiting for absolutely nothing, when he knows that Sho didn’t lie to him about that (because Sho never lied to him. He held back, he himself admitted that but he never lied to Jun) so why does it feel that way? Why does it feel as if Sho just made him believe in some things that aren’t really true even when he knows very well that that isn’t the case at all?  
  
“Tell me what to do,” he finds himself whispering in the darkness one time or probably more than once, expecting some sort of answer in his lonesome. He has to bite his lip to keep from screaming when he realizes that the voice he expects to answer him is still Sho’s despite him being already more than aware that that’s no longer possible because Sho’s not here anymore and Jun’s alone, just like how he was before some four months ago.  
  
Why is it so hard for him to go back to the way things were before Sho?  
  
He knows the answer to that. It’s hard for him because he doesn’t remember how that life was, if it was a life to begin with. He remembers it of course, he’s still mostly machine after all, but what he doesn’t remember is whether he was content with that setup before because if the answer is yes, he won’t believe it.  
  
And if the answer is no, then that just takes him back to square one where he doesn’t know what to do and he will eventually ask the darkness again, “What do I do?” expecting to hear Sho tell him in a very stern voice that you get up, that’s what you do. You get up and you walk, you move and you continue moving forward. You don’t look back and you most certainly do not allow yourself to linger.  
  
“Make sure you get yourself there,” Nino once said.  
  
Easier said than done, Jun wants to say, but he knows Nino is right because Nino is never wrong and he is Nino. He knows Nino will say the same things the Sho his head conjures up all the time says because they’re both right. They’re both right that he’s better than this, and Jun suspects that Nino will even go as far as telling him that this isn’t what Sho would have wanted for him and Jun owes it to himself to honor the idea of that.  
  
And deep inside Jun, he knows that to be true. He’d been with Sho long enough to know that Sho would want nothing but for Jun to snap out of this because he knows that Sho believed that he’s better than this.  
  
You’re not as fragile as this, he tells himself, knowing Sho would tell him the same.  
  
Eventually, Jun learns that grief isn’t all sadness and sorrow and agony coursing through your veins. It takes a while, even longer, but the day comes when he finally learns how to breathe again without feeling like every breath is a trial. The day comes when he finally learns he can stand without any of his knees feeling like they’re going to fail him. It takes a while, a really long one at that, but the day comes when he can finally look at the regolith and its tiny, green sprout at the center and not feel like it’s there to mock his entire existence and the reality he has come to terms with in the most unexpected way possible.  
  
It still hurts to think of Sho, but sometimes there are those days that Jun can think of him and remember how enthusiastic he was over learning a new language, how he forced himself to do basic yoga just because Jun said so, how he said Jun’s name for the first time and how he first smiled at Jun.  
  
There are days when Jun can breathe and think of Sho at the same time and Jun counts those days as those wherein he has managed to slowly pull himself through. It’s during those times he learns that what Sho left him was something else, more than an impression and certainly more than a feeling, even more than the memory chip he keeps beside Sho’s necklace and vial of orange dirt. He relearns, while his own functionality is showing signs of wear, that he still has time and that it’s always been up to him what to do with what remains of it, never mind how much or how little of it is left.  
  
He learns that he can still smile and the first time he’s able to do so is when Nino comes to his apartment, panting with his hands on his knees, and he’s saying, “Shit, Jun-kun, I just ran here and you’d never believe it, I’m fucking tired and my leg, or probably the both of them fucking useless things, feel as if they’re going to give out. Is this how wearing out feels like? I’m totally fucked then!”  
  
He learns that Nino’s time is also upon him. Aiba confirms it when Jun asks, saying that Nino is more than a month older than Jun. But like before, it’s not Aiba who tells him Nino’s incept date.  
  
“Year 2233, June 17th, Jun-kun. That’s the date, that’s the incept date,” Nino tells him during another visit. Nino doesn’t sound sad about it, instead he sounds content, like he already made peace with the fact that he’s going to die eventually and nothing’s going to change that. Jun supposes it’s the Aiba element once more. He expects Aiba to be sad about it, but when he voices it out to Nino, Nino just shrugs.  
  
“You know how he is. He’s probably hiding clones of me in his basement, more copies of Ninomiya Kazunari the pleasure model, all ready to activate once I go,” Nino tells him, looking unconcerned. “All kidding aside, he’ll be fine. He’s okay with it, just as I am okay with it. He’ll pull through.”  
  
Nino pauses, giving him a look he can’t define. “Just like you.”  
  
Jun thinks he knows now why Nino is here. He’s here because he’s checking up on Jun, just like what he used to do before Jun met Sho. Jun remains quiet for a while, then he surprises himself by saying, “What happened to, ‘Ninomiya Kazunari the intergalactic slut’?” and Nino's jaw drops, shock obvious in his features.  
  
“Did you just—? Just now, that was a joke, wasn’t it? Oh my god!” Nino exclaims with a hand over his mouth and Jun swats at him good-naturedly.  
  
Jun is still grieving, and he thinks he’ll be grieving until his own time comes, but he’s also starting to cope, and maybe, just maybe, he’s going to be all right.  
  
Someday, his own mind tells him. Eventually.


	8. Sic Itur Ad Astra

**Year 2237, March 17th, in the off-world colony of Praximus V, in the Triangulum Galaxy.**  
Praximus Main Shipyard, Platform 65-371A, shuttle 0637 leaving for NGC-3031.  
  
He didn’t bring much, which is probably a surprising concept given his luxurious lifestyle for the past three years, but that’s how it is.  
  
He has a knapsack, Sho’s memory chip and his necklace and vial of dirt inside, even Sho’s screwdriver which he decided to unearth from one of the numerous boxes at the last minute. He brought a few of Sho’s tools, even fewer changes of clothes, though he made sure to bring the jumpsuit Sho had given him with his name on. He also has his own pad which carries all of the necessary documents and the rest of his credits. He wears the necklace Sho put on his neck, feels the weight of it against his skin and on most days it no longer feels crushing somehow.  
  
He also brought a capsule pod with him. He had to go through a lot of clearances for it, but he’s bringing it with him to Bode’s Galaxy because he can’t just leave him here, can he? Not when he’s the one who suggested this whole “gallivanting in outer space,” as Nino puts it, affair.  
  
Jun didn’t want him to be scrapped. The only choice for replicants when they die is to either fall to the scrap heap and be destroyed for good or chucked somewhere in outer space via airlock. Jun knows which one Sho would prefer so he picks that choice and decides that a galaxy of some ten million light years away is the place to make it happen. Not here, not in Praximus, not in Triangulum.  
  
He feels that if he does that, if he looks up to the skies of the newly-established, struggling and still unnamed colony he’ll soon find himself a part of, Sho’s just there with him, and that eventually, Jun will join him there, in the skies of another distant planet that isn’t Praximus or any of its sisters.  
  
“You’re Matsumoto?” the shuttlecraft pilot asks him. The pilot is reading the roster now and this is Jun’s last chance to back out if he wants to.  
  
“Yes,” he answers dutifully, and the pilot takes a moment to blink repeatedly at Jun’s listed credentials and authorizations.  
  
“What are you going to that far-flung place for? What are you helping out with?” the pilot asks, probably out of sheer curiosity or simply the human habit of making small talk. Then again, Jun’s case has to be most curious for the human, because Jun is obviously leaving his life of luxury in Praximus for a shot at starting over in a place that probably has nothing concrete yet.  
  
Jun tilts his head in thought. “Repairs, mostly,” he says, remembering the way Sho said it to him the first time they met and the memory makes him smile. “I’m good with shuttles.”  
  
The pilot’s eyebrows lift at that, definitely expecting something else instead because Jun is a pleasure model and he looks like one through and through. It’s so easy to assume that he’s going there to fatten up his bank account.  
  
But he’s not and he likes how it catches this human off-guard. I learned that from Sho, he thinks proudly. I learned that from him among many other things.  
  
“How good?” the pilot asks because every shuttlecraft pilot needs basic training on shuttle mechanics before they can get the clearance and the license to fly one to the deep recesses of space. Jun knows that because Sho told him about it once.  
  
Jun smiles. “I learned from the best,” is all he says. Sho taught him everything he needed to know and left him with so much more. Sho taught him that he can be someone else other than what his maker intended for him to be, that he can defy any set parameters and that it's never too late to act on any of it. Jun owes Sho so much and Jun cannot think of a far more fitting adjective to describe how his life with Sho was like. It is the best decision Jun ever made in his life, when he listened to Nino and went out to meet Sho, when he accepted Sho's proposal that they learn from one another, leading to things he never thought he could ever have.  
  
He will never regret any of it even if things didn't work out the way he imagined them to be. Sho also taught him that, that mindset of not being sorry and not regretting anything they shared because what mattered was they gave it a shot even if time wasn't on their side.  
  
The pilot seems satisfied, nodding to himself before he’s telling Jun, “That’ll be useful, indeed. Lucky for all of us in here,” he pauses a bit, and finally, “Last chance to back out, Matsumoto-san,” and Jun’s shaking his head. The pilot nods at him once more before moving to the next person on the roster.  
  
Jun looks out the window and waits. He has no idea for how long, but soon they’re taking off, the shipyard tiles a mixture of different shades of blue before blending in one color, and finally they’re out of the spacedock, Praximus itself looking like lines of fluorescent lights and nothing like the place Jun found himself living in for the past three years.  
  
Is this how Praximus looked like when viewed from the sky? The lines of bright lights indicating life look like rivers of gold stretched across an inky patch of land, and it’s all so captivating that Jun thinks he’s been missing out after all these years.  
  
And to think that he almost didn’t leave.  
  
He leans back in his tiny booth, the space just enough for himself, the knapsack on his lap and the capsule pod in front of him, strapped to the wall he’s currently facing.  
  
“We’re going,” he says, hoping Sho can hear him wherever Sho is right now. Jun thinks Sho does because he believes he keeps a part of Sho in him and he carries that part with him no matter what, no matter where. “We’re finally going.”  
  
And he thinks Sho would be happy about that. He would definitely smile at Jun and say, “Well it’s about time, don’t you think?” and Jun himself would undoubtedly agree with him because yes, Sho has always been right about that, that it’s never too late to do something like this.  
  
Probably not even too late for him to become a space pirate if he wishes it.  
  
He laughs at the idea, imagining that Aiba will probably like that and cheer him on. Nino will facepalm about it but will probably ask for a percentage of the loot, and Ohno will just give him the okay with a smile on his face.  
  
He made a promise to send word to every single one of them once he reaches Messier 81, which is in three weeks’ time. He promised because Aiba will definitely worry about him and he will definitely annoy Nino about it. Ohno will worry as well despite his quiet demeanor, and Nino, well. Nino will deny that he worries, but he did send Jun a note of, “You tell me if they have spas in there,” and Jun’s sure that’s just Nino’s way of caring because there’s no way there are spas in a starting colony.  
  
He doesn’t turn back, doesn’t face the window again until there’s nothing but the inky blackness of space surrounding him and the shuttle. He doesn’t look outside until there’s nothing but the stars leaving dragging lines as the shuttle finally enters into warp drive, an assurance that finally, finally Jun is leaving Praximus V behind.  
  
There’s nothing left for him but to keep looking forward, anyway.  
  
\--  
  
Matsumoto Jun has five months, thirteen days, seven hours, and forty-two seconds left to live.  
  
It feels like enough.

**Author's Note:**

> One of the many translations for sic itur ad astra is "Thus you shall go to the stars."
> 
> All technical terms you've read and shuttlecraft shenanigans are based on my Star Trek marathons as of late, though I may have changed a few things here and there so as not to make this an accidental Star Trek AU. Any tidbit about a galaxy is factual.
> 
> And lastly, thank you very much for reading. Any feedback regarding this story will be much appreciated seeing as this is the longest thing I have written so far (not that I wrote much, but yeah). You can also find me [on tumblr](http://sunblades.tumblr.com).
> 
> eta (03/01/2015): They just announced that a Blade Runner sequel is coming up. I might as well push through with this universe if that's the case.


End file.
